


Vampires In Manhattan

by Selenay



Series: Vampires In Manhattan [1]
Category: The Avengers (2012)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Alternate Reality, Drama, M/M, Romance, Vampires
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-08
Updated: 2012-11-08
Packaged: 2017-11-18 06:22:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 25,392
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/557863
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Selenay/pseuds/Selenay
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Transported to another dimension, Clint and Phil find themselves quarantined in the middle of a vampire plague. Meeting their duplicates and seeing how everything went wrong could be the push they need to confront their own feelings. </p><p>But with time running out, they need to find a way home and, if they're lucky, a way to fix the other world as well.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Art: Vampires In Manhattan](https://archiveofourown.org/works/557569) by [sian1359](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sian1359/pseuds/sian1359). 



> This was written for the 2012 Marvel Big Bang and the wonderful [sian1359](http://archiveofourown.org/users/sian1359/pseuds/sian1359) made some gorgeous artwork for it.
> 
> [Art Masterpost on AO3](http://archiveofourown.org/works/557569).
> 
> My beta and cheerleader, Fahre, worked tirelessly to keep me writing when I got nervous or just frustrated and then went above and beyond to help me turn my rough draft into something readable. This included multiple thwappings when I threatened to give up and hours spent working through the technical problems you get when you're insane enough to write a fic with more than one version of several characters. Thank you.

[](http://s926.photobucket.com/albums/ad105/sian1359/covers%20and%20frontispieces/?action=view&current=marvelbbartfrontis.jpg)

Clint Barton nocked an arrow, holding it loosely on the string.

"Hawkeye, I need a little help down here."

Steve's voice in Clint's ear sounded slightly strained and he peered down to street-level, looking for the distinctive red, white and blue uniform. He spotted Steve and absently loosed an arrow at a flying Doombot that banked and made to close in on his rooftop position. Four more had converged on Steve and another five were on their way in. Clint scanned the skies quickly, spotting Iron Man and Thor in the middle of a small knot of flying robots.

"Thor, Iron Man," he said, "Cap's pinned down."

Stark blasted two Doombots, sending fragments of hot, sparking metal down to Park Avenue and Thor's lightning fragmented the rest.

"We're on it," Stark said.

Clint tracked their path through his bow's sight as they swooped towards Steve. Stark's repulsors fired as soon as he was within range while Thor landed next to Steve and began clearing Doombots with massive swipes of Mjolnir. The vantage point that Clint had chosen was good, high enough to see most of the action but not so high that the ground-level fighting was impossible to follow. There were fewer of the flying machines now, maybe half a dozen, and Clint took out a couple that flew too near his location. Stark's enhancements to the explosive arrows were fucking awesome.

Out of the corner of his eye, Clint spotted movement on the street around the corner from where Steve, Stark and Thor were now fighting off most of the Doombots. A van raced up the street and stopped with a squeal of burning rubber. The back doors flew open and four men jumped out, joined a moment later by the driver and passenger. They began pulling something out of the van and Clint squinted down and swore as he recognised one of the men as Doctor Doom himself.

"Nat, trouble about two hundred meters from your location," he said. "Looks like the Doctor is making an appearance and he's got some kind of big machine with him."

"On it," Natasha called.

"I'm on my way down," Clint said.

"We're a bit tied up over here," Stark said. "Shit, Cap get down!"

Clint switched to a grappling arrow and stepped onto the edge of the roof. He drew, nocked and released, already falling as the arrow found its target and locked on.

"Hawkeye, Widow, I'm heading for your location," Coulson said over the comm.

"Sir-"

"No arguments. Concentrate on not breaking your head when you land."

The line ended six feet from the street. Clint made a mental note to get R&D to add more length to the next batch as he tucked, rolled and swore at the sting of tarmac on the unprotected skin of his arms. He bounced to his feet and ran towards the group gathered around the machine. Judging by the way that Doom kept checking a small unit in his hand and gesturing for his men to move the machine, precise positioning was important. That was the kind of thing that never ended well for anyone.

One of Doom's men suddenly cried out and dropped to the floor and Clint spotted Coulson a few feet away, gun levelled, just before Natasha slammed feet-first into the back of another. The rest of Doom's men, augmented by three more from the van, spread out to protect the machine. Clint took two down easily, his arrows finding their targets as always, and then he was in the thick of the hand-to-hand fighting and his focus narrowed to the space immediately around him.

This was why he did not notice that Doom had finished programming his machine and stepped back. He was aware at the back of his mind that he was being herded away from Coulson and Natasha and it made him fight harder, move faster, trying to hold his ground.

Something was building in the air, an electric feeling that made Clint's skin itch.

"I've got lights on that device," Natasha said, sounding a little breathless.

"I see them, Widow," Coulson said and Clint heard the distinctive sound of gun shots.

One of Clint's opponents fell to an elbow in the chin, another to a roundhouse kick. That left him with one and Clint ducked as the other man swung and then suddenly his guy was running away.

A flash of green made Clint look up in time to see the Hulk land next to the machine and send Doom flying down the street with one swipe of his huge arm. Coulson and Natasha's guys were all either down or running away. Clint had always figured that when the bad guys ran away it was a bad idea to run towards whatever they were running away from but he was a superhero now so he ran towards the machine.

Bright green light suddenly shot from it, a ball of colour that swirled around and almost blinded him. Clint skidded to a stop, too late, and collided with the sharp metal edge of the device. Pain lanced through his head as the light grew brighter and Clint dropped to his knees, fighting the urge to pass out. His skin was on fire and his stomach twisted and then it all stopped and everything went dark.

***

"Barton, talk to me. You need to wake up now."

The darkness receded gradually and Clint blinked a few times as the fuzzy shape above him resolved into Coulson's concerned face.

"Sir, I didn't know you cared," he said faintly.

"I don't care at all," Coulson said lightly. "We just need another pair of eyes."

A wave of dizziness made Clint feel slightly sick as Coulson helped him sit. Clint put a hand to his forehead, wincing when his fingers came away wet with blood.

"You hit your head on that thing, I think," Coulson said.

"Oh, that's what the headache is," Clint said.

"Some of it, yes," Coulson said. "We all passed out, you and Doctor Banner are just taking longer to wake up."

Some of the fuzziness evaporated. "Is Banner alright?"

"De-Hulked, but breathing," Coulson said. "Agent Romanov's with him. You need a hand?"

He allowed Coulson to help him stand, leaning against him until the unsteadiness subsided. When the world settled and stopped moving, Clint frowned and reluctantly moved away from Coulson's side so that he could take in their surroundings properly.

"How long was I out?" he asked.

Coulson's expression was troubled. "According to my watch, only a few minutes."

"So where is everyone?"

The street around them was deserted. Not the kind of deserted that came with a lull in traffic, this was the kind of deserted that echoed and sent papers drifting along the road in gusts of wind. It had the abandoned air of a place where humans rarely went. A scorch mark around the device, the device itself and Clint, Natasha, Coulson and Banner were the only people on the street. Shop windows had been boarded up and even the distant traffic signals were dead.

It sent chills down Clint's spine.

"Comms are down," Coulson said. "We're on our own here. Wherever here is."

"What are you thinking, sir?" Clint asked

His bow was a couple of feet away and before he could move over to it, Coulson had anticipated him and was crouching to carefully pick it up. Clint took it, feeling guiltily thankful that he wouldn't have to bend and deal with the dizziness that he suspected would follow. There were a couple of scratches on the bow's limbs but apart from that it looked unscathed and Clint breathed a sigh of relief.

"I'm not sure yet," Coulson said, straightening up and drawing his gun. "As Stark would point out, Doom's ideas can be strange and I wouldn't rule anything out yet."

"Vaporising everyone in New York apart from the people standing five feet from this thing doesn't seem like his style, though," Clint said, nocking an arrow.

"Banner's coming round," Natasha called.

She was kneeling next to where he lay slumped against the device. Coulson's jacket had been carefully arranged to give him some dignity and Clint realised that if everyone had disappeared, so had Banner's back-up clothes.

Banner groaned softly and Natasha murmured something soothing, too quietly to make out.

"Sir, do we have a plan?" Clint asked, scanning the empty street, the buildings above, the rooftops.

"What happened?" Banner asked, his voice raw and groggy.

"We should try to find cover," Coulson said.

From somewhere far away came the sound of an engine. It was approaching at speed and a moment later a large black truck swung into view from a side street. Although it was the first sign of life they had seen, it did not give Clint that happy "we're saved" feeling.

"Think it's too late for that," Clint said, drawing his bow as the truck pulled up a few feet away.

Men poured out of the vehicle and ran to surround them, guns trained on the little group with every sign of professionalism. They were clad head-to-toe in black, body armour layered over heavy uniforms. Even their faces were protected with thick glass visors so that not an inch of flesh showed. A tiny insignia on the left breast of each man looked similar to the SHIELD logo but Clint had never seen any SHIELD men dressed like this.

He had also never seen SHIELD soldiers with machetes slung across their backs.

"Put your weapons down," a voice ordered.

With the darkened glass of their visors obscuring their faces, it was impossible to tell who had spoken. Clint flicked a glance to Coulson who nodded slightly.

"Weapons down," the voice repeated.

"OK, OK," Clint muttered under his breath, carefully taking down his bow and removing the arrow.

He made a show of putting bow and arrow on the floor, gently, as Coulson did the same and raised his hands.

"You there, on the floor," the voice said. "Put your weapons on the ground where we can see them."

Clint heard Natasha unholstering her guns and the metallic sound as they were placed carefully on the pavement. There were several sharply indrawn breaths around them. For a moment Clint could almost feel the danger in the air, that electric sense that everything was in the balance and at any moment something could go terribly wrong.

"You will accompany us," the voice ordered.

"Where are you taking us?" Coulson asked.

"That information is classified," the voice ordered.

"Who are you working for?" Coulson asked.

"Sir, that information-"

"Right, classified," Coulson said. "I guess we have no choice then."

Three of the soldiers lowered their guns and moved forward to scoop up the weapons. Another spoke into a radio on his shoulder and a minute later a man jumped out of the truck holding a red blanket. He tossed it towards Banner and out of the corner of his eye, Clint saw Natasha help Banner to wrap the blanket around his body and drape Coulson's jacket over his shoulders. Banner looked wobbly for a moment as he stood but he seemed to recover quickly and gestures from their captors strongly implied that Natasha would not be allowed to help him walk anywhere.

They were herded towards the truck, pushed into the back and pointed to seats that conveniently split them all up among the soldiers. Several men remained behind to guard the machine and Clint could only hope that whatever the hell had happened, there would be a way to undo it.

***

Phil Coulson concentrated on the sound of the tires on the road and the turns they made, trying to track their progress on his mental map of the city. The truck did not stop and there was no sound of other vehicles, reinforcing the impression that New York had been in some way depopulated. 

Nobody spoke. There was a solid knot of worry in Phil's stomach, the kind that came from being responsible for injured colleagues and having no clue about what was happening. He told himself that it was professional concern that kept him glancing down the bench to where Barton sat, his head resting against the side of the truck and his eyes closed.

Eventually they slowed and Phil heard the sound of a metal door rising. When they slowly drove forward, the change in the sound of the engine told him that they were in some kind of underground parking lot. They stopped and the back doors swung open. Phil was prodded to stand and get out and he was relieved to see that one of the soldiers helped Doctor Banner, who was less pale than he had been but still looked a bit wobbly and fuzzy. Barton climbed out looking steadier on his feet than Doctor Banner, although he winced as he dropped to the ground.

They were led to a stairwell and herded upward, climbing for three flights. None of the soldiers shed any of their gear and Phil was absolutely certain that every one of them was prepared to shoot if they saw anything they did not like.

Their destination turned out to be a long room lined on one side with cells that had thick clear doors.

"Dungeons?" he heard Barton mutter. "Really?"

Four of the doors swung open automatically.

"Who's in charge here?" Phil asked, keeping his face bland despite the implication of those doors.

"That information is classified," one of the solders said. "Please step into the cells."

Agent Romanov's expression was blank but Phil knew she was probably looking for an escape. Unfortunately he could not easily see one: there were too many men, too many guns and too much chance that they would all be killed before they could get anywhere. He caught her eye and shook his head. She did not betray that she had seen him but she entered her cell without protest. Barton gave him the barest hint of a smile as he entered the next cell, just enough to tell Phil that he was fine and he wasn't planning to do anything stupid yet. The knot in Phil's stomach eased at that.

The doors swung shut behind them and a distant beep signalled that they were locked. None of the soldiers left. Instead they all lined up along the wall opposite the cells, their guns held loosely across their chests.

Phil eyed the soldiers for a moment and decided to take a chance.

"Is everyone OK?" he called, hoping that the cells were not sound proofed.

The men opposite him immediately trained their guns on him and someone ordered, "No talking."

Several more soldiers pointed their guns as a chorus of okays came from the other cells, but Phil felt reassured by the calmness in their muffled voices. He shrugged at the soldiers and they slowly lowered their guns again.

Bare concrete lined the cells with absolutely nothing to sit or lie on so Phil leaned against the back wall and settled to wait.

The wait was not as long as he thought it would be. Perhaps fifteen minutes later there was a beep and the main door opened. All the soldiers snapped to attention and Phil straightened and moved closer to the front of his cell. A number of possibilities had occurred to him as he waited but, he had to admit, the man who walked through the door had never appeared anywhere on his mental list.

From the expression on his face, it was a surprise to him as well.

"Fuck," he heard Barton say incredulously.

Agent Romanov's swearing was muffled and in Russian but he understood her reaction perfectly.

It was a strange experience to look into the eyes of a man wearing your own face.


	2. Chapter 2

"Fuck me," Clint said, looking at the man outside his cell.

It was uncanny. He seemed almost identical to Coulson. Clint had spent enough time with Coulson to see there were tiny differences between the two men but it was still incredibly weird. Not that he stalked Coulson or anything creepy like that, but he was a marksman and it was his job to observe things. The Coulson standing outside the cells had more stress lines around his mouth and the hint of stubble was something Clint had only seen towards the end of long ops where hygiene had been at the bottom of their priority list.

He wore the same heavy black fatigues that the soldiers did, without the body armour, which was where the biggest difference lay: Clint had never seen Coulson in anything other than civilian attire. He kind of hated his brain because now was not a good time to be noticing how good Coulson looked in a uniform.

Apart from these he could have been the same man, right down to the expression of mild bemusement that Clint knew meant Coulson didn't know what was going on and hadn't ruled out the possibility of shooting someone in the leg to find out.

The other Coulson spent time looking at their Coulson and then he paced down to stand in front of Clint's cell. His eyes widened slightly and Clint did not know what to make of that expression: he looked confused and sad all at once. There might even have been a hint of anger mixed in but it closed down quickly and he looked away and moved on. Then the other Coulson looked briefly into Natasha's cell before continuing down the corridor and standing in front of Banner's door.

"You," he said, slowly and deliberately, "are supposed to be dead. I don't know who any of you are but you died two years ago. What are you?"

"Doctor Bruce Banner." There was a hint of annoyance in Banner's voice. "And I'm not dead."

"So I can see," was all that the Coulson said.

The main door opened again with a beep and Clint was obviously getting used to the world being fucked up and weird because it seemed perfectly fine for a second Natasha to walk in. She was also wearing thick black fatigues, obviously the uniform that all the popular kids wore around these parts, and her hair had been scraped back into a tight knot at the base of her neck. Clint frowned as he saw the red scar that ran from her right temple to her jaw. It looked recent and he would have laid odds that it had never been treated by a surgeon.

She handed a file to her Coulson, who opened it and scanned the pages inside quickly.

"They're not LMDs," he said and she nodded.

"They were also captured in broad daylight," she said. "Didn't put up a fight."

"I heard."

"Excuse me."

It was Coulson's voice - their Coulson and Clint really needed to find a better way to differentiate between them, at least in his head - and he had that hint of pissiness in his tone that Clint adored.

"Can you please explain what is going on?" Coulson continued. "Where are we?"

The other Coulson passed the file back to Natasha and crossed his arms. "You're in the Stark Tower and establishing what is going on is what I'm trying to do."

"See, I'd believe you about the Stark Tower thing," Clint said, "except this is way too low-tech for Stark."

"Not enough force-fields," Natasha agreed from the cell next door.

"So you know Tony Stark," the other Coulson asked.

"Obviously," their Coulson said.

"Huh."

"We could just knock them out and get medical to take a look," the other Natasha suggested. "They've been itching for new samples."

"That might not be a good idea," Banner said quickly.

"It's your call," Natasha said to her Coulson, the scar twisting as she graced him with just the briefest of smiles.

In that moment Clint was almost certain that the other Coulson was watching him and he appeared to be waiting for something. He looked exhausted suddenly. It was something Clint rarely saw in his Coulson and he didn't know what to make of the ache in his chest at the thought.

"Fine," the other Coulson said after a long pause. "Do it."

Clint drew a breath to yell as a quiet hiss sounded somewhere in the cell. He could hear Banner and Natasha shouting but the air smelled odd and a moment later he was unconscious.

***

"This is going to get old really fast," Clint said, rubbing his head as though that would actually help with the nagging hang over from the sedative.

"At least the scenery is better now," Natasha said.

She was right: the four of them were groggily waking up in some kind of dormitory rather than a set of bare cells. It definitely qualified as an improvement even though Clint was fairly certain that the door would be locked if he tried.

Coulson was sitting up on his narrow bed opposite Clint's, rubbing his eyes. It was easy to tell that the correct Natasha was in the room because her face was smooth and beautiful as always. The other Coulson, however, had been almost identical apart from the clothes. Clint studied the man sitting across the room from him carefully for a moment, taking in every movement and flicker of thought that passed over his face. He knew the lines around Coulson's eyes and the scars on his hands almost as well as Clint knew his own.

There had been subtle differences with the other Coulson, not obvious enough for Clint to be able to list them but just enough to set his teeth on edge with a sense of wrongness. 

Clint stood, swallowing hard as his stomach rolled, and moved to stand next to the bed.

"Nice try," he said before punching Coulson in the face.

The punch never landed, of course, because whoever this was had all of Coulson's reflexes. He blocked the punch, swept Clint's legs out from under him and had Clint on his stomach with an arm twisted behind his back in a moment.

"Ow," Clint said and then, "Nat, don't hit the nice fake Coulson. He'll dislocate my arm."

"Did I miss something?" Banner asked, sitting up and peering around.

"I won't hit," Natasha said with that alarmingly calm, flat tone she could take on, "if he tells us what's going on and brings our Coulson back."

There was a tense moment before the pressure on Clint's arm released and he was allowed to sit up and massage his shoulder. All signs of grogginess had disappeared from the man wearing Coulson's face and he was smiling tightly.

"Your instincts are good," the Coulson duplicate said.

"Thanks," Clint said. "And you're fast."

There was a shrug and then the other man raised his voice slightly to say, "OK, bring him in."

The door to the dormitory opened and another Coulson entered, this one flanked by four guards, dressed in green scrubs and barefoot. His expression would have looked blank to most people but Clint could see the extreme annoyance that flickered in his eyes. Whether it was due to the confinement, the handcuffs or the theft of his suit and shoes was hard to tell. It was probably a mixture of all three.

There was a faint scuffling sound as the door began to swing shut again and then Tony Stark pushed his way through.

Clint gaped for a moment and then snorted. Of course there was a Tony Stark here. No world could possibly be complete without one, as Stark would probably tell anyone if they ever asked.

"Didn't work, huh?" Stark said with a smirk. "Told you it wouldn't work."

The duplicate Coulson shrugged. "It was worth a try. Do you have anything?"

Stark's hair had that frazzled, standing on end look that Clint normally associated with a long night in the workshop and his eyes were darting everywhere.

"Of course I have something," Stark said. "Do I ever come to you with nothing? I never have nothing. They're you. Just...not. Different universe."

Banner's head came up and he frowned. "Many worlds theory?"

"Sure, why not?" Stark said. "Unless you have a better explanation for all this."

"Not really," Banner said thoughtfully. "Can you prove it?"

Stark shook his head sharply. "Not yet. Give me a few days with that machine you appeared with and I might. Where did you get that? Coulson Two over here is as bad as our Coulson with the classified information bullshit."

There was a choked sound from both Coulsons and Clint grinned. That, at least, was a normal Coulson reaction to Stark.

"I've got to admit, sirs, numbering you is probably the only way to keep everything straight," Clint said with a smirk.

"Is your Stark as annoying as this one?" Coulson-in-a-suit asked.

"He gets better after the first few tasings."

"Thanks for the tip."

"Hey, standing right here," Stark protested. "Maybe we should try to keep you two apart, the world isn't ready for this much concentrated evil."

Coulson - and Clint thought that maybe he'd have to learn to think of their Coulson as Phil and this one as Coulson just to maintain some sanity - rolled his eyes. "Shut up, Stark."

"Shit, boss, he's just like you," Clint said with admiration.

"If we can get back on track?" Coulson straightened his stolen jacket. "Multiple worlds, Stark."

"It's a quantum thing," Stark said. "So not much proof, but there's a theory that every choice makes a new universe. Toss a coin and two universes - one where the coin was heads, another tails."

"The theory also says that the two universes can't interact with each other," Banner added. "Apparently that part of the theory is wrong."

"I like him, can we keep him?" Stark asked.

"No."

Clint couldn't actually tell which Coulson said it.

Natasha was looking thoughtful. "So this universe and our universe split at some stage and followed different paths."

"Exactly," Stark said. "In your universe, to take an easy example, Doctor Banner didn't attempt to rescue a student from some kind of insane gamma radiation experiment that even I think was stupid and I've strapped experimental repulsor tech to my feet for fun. So you have a living Doctor Banner."

"Uh, well, that wasn't the reason that I was exposed to gamma radiation but I did take a fairly major dose in my world too," Banner said

Stark raised his eyebrows. "Huh. That's...interesting."

Banner shrugged. "It seemed like a good idea at the time."

"What were you trying to do?" Stark asked.

"I thought we were doing something good. It was supposed to make me immune to gamma radiation." Banner's smile was sardonic. "In a way it worked, I guess. It turns out that what I was actually doing was creating super soldiers. Not that that worked out very well for anyone either."

There was a sudden change in the atmosphere in the room, a heightening of interest that made Clint tense. Natasha sensed it as well, judging from the way that she shifted her weight slightly into a more fight-ready stance.

"Super soldiers." The other Coulson moved towards Banner. "You were involved with that project?"

Banner seemed to draw in on himself, folding his arms across his chest. "Briefly."

"So you know something about it, some of the technical details."

"I've spent the last few years trying to reverse the effects," Banner said with a faint smile. "I'm familiar with some of it."

"Are we all friends now?" Stark asked. "Have you finished trying to analyse them to death? Because I've got some guys down in the lab who would love to spend some time with Doctor Banner's brain. Don't worry, they'll want it in your skull and functioning."

There was a moment of indecision on the duplicate Coulson's face and then he nodded to the guards, who stepped away from their Coulson and unfastened the handcuffs.

"Fine, take Banner downstairs," Coulson said. "I'll give our guests the tour."

"It's my tower, why don't I get to give the tour?" Stark asked.

All he received was a glare and, to Clint's surprise, Stark deflated slightly and beckoned to Banner.

"Come on, you're going to love it," he said cheerfully. "The rest of this place isn't what I'd planned, but we got the labs finished before everything went to shit so they're amazing."

"This is really the Stark Tower?" Natasha asked.

"Of course it's...I did build it in your world, didn't I?" Stark said.

"Our version is..." Natasha trailed off.

"Shinier," Clint supplied.

Stark looked unaccountably depressed.

"But, you know, great work on the dungeon," Clint added. "Our tower doesn't have a dungeon."

Stark opened his mouth but anything he might have said was drowned out as a loud alarm started to sound. Red lights flashed above the door and the guards waited barely a moment before leaving at a fast march.

"Stark, get Banner to the lab and suit up," Coulson ordered.

Their Coulson frowned and took a step forward. "What's going on?"

Again there was a moment of indecision in the other Coulson's face and then he gestured for them to follow.

"I assume you're all weapons trained?" he asked, leading them rapidly down a dimly lit corridor.

He did not wait for their assent before continuing, "Don't let them close on you, don't even let them within arm's reach. If any of them scratch or bite you, even if the skin doesn't look broken, take yourself out of the fight and alert someone. Try for head shots with the explosive rounds, even if it doesn’t kill them every time it'll slow them down. If that fails, put as much regular ammo in them as you can and wait for someone with the training to deal with them when they go down."

"Deal with what?" Natasha asked.

They rounded a corner and stopped. Ahead an orderly line of men were being rapidly issued with guns and...

"Are those swords?" Clint asked incredulously.

"And pikes," their Coulson added.

"That's a scythe," Natasha said.

This world's Coulson smiled tightly. "Decapitation is the only reliable way of killing vampires."


	3. Chapter 3

"Our lives are not like other peoples' lives," Clint said as he searched for a target. "Why didn't you tell me about the cross-dimensional vampires when I signed up?"

"I thought the medical plan would be a bigger deciding factor," Coulson said. "You were bleeding out at the time, after all."

Clint sighted, pulled the trigger and watched as a vampire's head exploded and the remains collapsed to the ground.

"If you'd told me about the cross-dimensional vampires, you might not have had to shoot me," Clint said.

"Noted," Coulson said, shooting another vampire until it fell to the pavement still twitching. "I'll make sure to mention it the next time."

"The other you was right," Clint said as his next shot missed the head and exploded in a vampire's stomach thanks to a luckily timed jump. "These bastards are hard to take down."

His partially dismembered target landed awkwardly but having half his intestines missing did not stop him or even slow him much.

They had been assigned to a metal barricade outside the tower with instructions to shoot at anything not wearing a SHIELD uniform and stay there until someone retrieved them. None of them had been allowed to leave the building without the standard heavy, all-concealing uniform and body armour. It was a bitch to move in, Clint hated the way that it constricted his arms and the helmet restricted the wearer's view to whatever was directly in front of him. Ripping off the helmet and half the armour was a constant temptation but Clint resisted because the other Coulson had been very insistent and the other Natasha - he was starting to think of her as Romanov to avoid some of the confusion - had just looked at him until he promised.

Thinking about the other Coulson didn't help his confusion levels. Clint snuck a glance at the man beside him and tested out the feel of 'Phil' in his mind. It was still too weird to really work with yet, but he thought that maybe it would be easier to think of his Coulson as Phil and the other one as Coulson to purely keep them separate. Maybe. Eventually.

There was a shout somewhere in the melee and Clint sighted down his gun again. Nobody had allowed him to have his bow back. Even though there were only three explosive arrowheads left, he would have felt better with the familiar nock-draw-release rhythm. He'd never been as confident with guns.

What blew Clint away was that there were less than thirty creatures attempting to storm Stark Tower and they were only just being kept at bay. The so-called vampires were fast, even faster than Steve, and when the other Coulson said that decapitation was the only thing that stopped them he had meant it. The vampire that Clint had gutted wasn't even the most severely injured one out there and still moving.

Simply firing at random into the mass of creatures didn't work either: almost nothing made them stop for long and the SHIELD soldiers fighting with swords and scythes were actually more effective than the ones with guns.

Both Natashas were also out there somewhere. The one from this world, Romanov, wielded a staff tipped with long, lethal blades at either end that reminded Clint of Darth Maul's weird double light sabre without the red special effects.

He would always deny owning the Star Wars prequels if anyone asked.

Their own Natasha had grabbed a pair of swords in the armoury and given both Coulsons a challenging look before stalking away. Clint had seen both Natashas fighting side by side, whirling dervishes of destruction and grace and impossible physicality.

Stark, in a version of the Iron Man suit that looked several generations behind their Stark's current one and scratched to hell as well, was flying somewhere above. Clint could hear the repulsors every now and again but he had already seen how useless they were against a vampire unless Stark managed to accidentally blow their heads off. His job seemed to mainly be isolating vampires from the pack so that it was easier for soldiers with swords or explosive ammo to take them out.

The defences around Stark Tower were primitive, evidence of the hasty conversion from a business building to a military installation, and there were other teams sheltering behind similar metal barricades. The area around the base of the tower was lit with bright floodlights and beyond their glare the city was dark.

Another vampire, this one apparently a former US Postal worker, started advancing on their shelter and Coulson…Phil…Coulson emptied a magazine into it. The creature paused long enough for Clint to aim and fire and he whooped as its head exploded.

"Sir, this is deeply disturbing," he said, "but also kind of fun."

"Your definition of fun needs some work," Coulson said as he quickly reloaded.

"This from the man who takes intelligence briefings home with him for a bit of light reading," Clint said.

"There's nothing wrong with staying informed, Barton."

They tag-teamed another vampire and Clint grinned fiercely as it fell.

"I bet you were the kid that asked for more homework in high school," Clint said. "When we get back, we have got to find ways to fill up your evenings that don't involve work."

"What would you suggest?" Coulson asked.

Clint's brain stuttered to a halt for a second because he could think of a dozen things to suggest and all of them were wildly inappropriate for this particular moment.

So he said the first thing that came into his mind that wasn't Coulson-related. "Hey, they're running away!"

The remaining vampires were indeed running away, melting into the shadows beyond the floodlights, leaving behind a dozen headless corpses and the bodies of three SHIELD soldiers.

For a long moment nobody moved. Even with the all-concealing armour, the tension was visible as everyone held weapons ready in case this was a feint rather than a true retreat. The arrival of fresh men from the tower eased the taut atmosphere slightly. Weapons were lowered, although not put out of reach, and the new arrivals took over guard duty to allow the clean-up to begin.

Clint stood, shaking out the stiffness from crouching behind a metal wall for an hour or so. He felt Coulson do the same and saw two figures separate from the groups checking bodies to head in their direction. Even if they had not been carrying such distinctive weapons, Clint would have recognised Natasha's walk anywhere. It was a little freaky to see it in two women marching almost in sync.

"Keep your helmets on until we're in a secure area," Romanov said. "This way."

"Are you planning to tell us what's going on now?" Coulson asked.

"Of course," Romanov said. "Get cleaned up and we'll explain everything."

***

Phil was surprised when he and Barton were allowed to make their own way to the labs after they had been checked over and given clean uniforms. Apparently they were being trusted, although still not enough to be allowed to keep their sidearm. Compared to the drab, half-finished look around most of the tower, the labs were a brightly lit, sparkling haven that virtually shouted "Tony Stark lives here" to Phil's practised eye. It seemed that some things never changed in any universe and Stark's love for everything shiny and hi-tech was one of them.

Doctor Banner was already immersed in graphs and complex models in one corner of the lab and several technicians were busy at their workstations. The only person missing was Stark.

"Interesting priorities, sir," Barton said quietly. "Hardly anything spent on the defences, lab with the latest and greatest."

"You noticed," Phil said.

"The only thing they did spend on is that body armour," Barton said.

They had been allowed to return the body armour to the armoury but the heavy black fatigues were apparently mandatory. Phil would have much preferred to have his suit back and he could see how uncomfortable Barton was with the thick black jacket over the jumpsuit.

"I'm sorry about the delay, the incinerator wouldn't play ball."

Phil turned to see his double entering the room with the other Agent Romanov just behind him, both looking tired yet alert. It was still a very strange sensation to see another man wearing his face, Phil decided. Did he really look and sound like that?

"Incinerator?" Barton asked.

The other Agent Romanov shrugged. "Got to burn the bodies somehow."

"I thought vampires turned to dust," Barton said.

"Only on TV shows," Coulson said dryly.

"In real life," the other Agent Romanov said, "if you can kill them and make them stay dead they just rot in the streets."

"Stay dead?" Agent Romanov - their Agent Romanov - said.

Phil was starting to get a headache trying to keep track of how to think of both doubles. Barton's suggestion earlier, numbering them all, appealed in some ways but it was hard not to think of himself as the original and his double as the second version. He suspected that his duplicate probably considered himself as the original and arguing over it could get messy. Maybe SHIELD training should be updated to include a seminar on dealing with alternate universes, Phil thought. He was starting to think of his double as Coulson just to stop his brain shorting out every couple of minutes.

"There were a few incidents in the early days," the other Agent Romanov said. "When we figured out the decapitation thing it got easier."

That sounded…messy.

"Perhaps it would be best if you explained everything," Phil said.

His double nodded. "They're not vampires in the traditional sense. Stark started calling them vampires in the early days and the name...stuck."

Phil nodded. "Tony Stark does seem to do that."

"Where is Stark, by the way?"

"Where else? Playing with the toy they brought him," the other Agent Romanov said. "He's got it in his workshop downstairs."

"Is that a good idea?" Barton asked. "Sometimes he blows shit up and we don't have another one."

Phil couldn't stop a small smile at that.

"Probably not," his double said, "but he's the best man for working out how something like that functions. He may be the only person who can get you home."

"Point," Barton conceded.

"The vampires started out as an attempt at a super soldier serum," Coulson explained. "Nobody has been able to replicate Doctor Erskine's results on our world. It was a joint project between the Army and SHIELD, based in labs here in New York, and the initial data was promising so a small-scale human trial was authorized. On one level, it worked: the subjects have massively enhanced speed, strength and regenerative capabilities. They can heal from almost any wound within minutes."

Phil raised his eyebrows. "The decapitation?"

"It's the only thing they can't come back from," he confirmed.

"I have to say, I'm disappointed that a stake through the heart doesn't work," Barton said.

He shrugged. "We tried that. It doesn't work and you'll generally have your head torn off before you get close enough."

"Ouch."

"They also don't catch fire in sunlight, unfortunately, although they do get a very nasty sunburn."

"It heals in a couple of minutes, though," the other Agent Romanov added. "Doesn't even slow them down."

"It's fascinating, really," Doctor Banner said, approaching with a tablet in his hands. "They used a virus to re-write DNA. Somehow the virus is able to alter its host's body at a level we've never seen before. This kind of research is still only at the early stages in our world compared to what I've seen here."

"What was the catch?" their Agent Romanov asked.

Doctor Banner tapped something on his tablet and held it up, showing a graph that probably made sense to scientists. Everyone else just looked vaguely interested and confused.

"The virus changed their brain chemistry, enhancing aggression, removing inhibitions, and changing a lot of their basic responses to stimuli," Doctor Banner said. "It also changed the way that they process nutrients and, well, the end result is..."

"Blood-sucking fiends?" Barton suggested.

"That pretty much sums them up," Doctor Banner said.

Agent Romanov frowned. "If it's a virus, it has the potential to spread."

There was a pinched look around Coulson's eyes and Phil frowned.

"The scientists assured us that it had been engineered so that it was not transmissible," his double said. "Unfortunately, they were wrong."

"If they bite you and don't kill you, conversion takes up to two hours," the other Agent Romanov said. "By the time anyone realised what was happening, many of the people inside the facility were infected and several had already escaped into the city and started spreading it."

"We quarantined Manhattan, but three infected businessmen had already boarded planes at that stage. As it stands currently, there are quarantines around New York, Portland, and Seattle."

"I'm surprised the World Security Council hasn't suggested nuking everything," Barton said.

Phil nodded, wondering the same thing.

"They have," his double said. "It would start an international incident that nobody wants to consider yet: there are outbreaks in Russia, Great Britain and Germany. For the moment, working on a cure is our main focus."

"If New York is quarantined, what are you still doing here?" Agent Romanov asked.

"Protecting the people who stayed," the other Agent Romanov replied.

***

Clint poked suspiciously at the pile of yellowish stuff on his plate that the guy on the serving line assured him were rehydrated eggs.

Apparently the people who had made the great sacrifice and stayed in the quarantine area were being punished with monthly airdrops of terrible food.

The coffee was also bad, but it was hot and strong and Clint had barely slept for a couple of hours before giving up on the idea and following his nose to the cafeteria. He washed down the eggs, which tasted as bad as they looked, with a big gulp of coffee and tried not to grimace.

"That bad?"

A tray holding another plate of unappetising eggs landed on the table opposite him and Phil sat down. This was definitely Phil, not Coulson, despite the lack of suit and the unaccustomed unshaven look.

Clint was tired enough not to suppress the thought that the unshaven look was just as hot as the neatly suited and brushed look, damn the man.

"Well," Clint said carefully, "they are probably nutritionally balanced."

"Ah," Phil said and took a cautious bite. "Nutritionally balanced is probably the best that can be said."

Clint took another slurp of his coffee and nodded towards a table across the room where Coulson, Stark and Romanov were eating. "Looks like even Stark's money can't get everything in this world."

"At least the coffee is hot," Phil said.

"If my vote makes any difference, we should let Banner help these guys as much as he can," Clint said. "They need saving from the food."

"I'll take your recommendation under advisement," Phil said.

"I really thought we'd seen everything," Clint said, "and then we came to the world where vampires are real. Where's Buffy when you need her?"

"Somewhere in California, I'd imagine," Phil said blandly.

Clint choked on his coffee.

"I have three nieces, Barton," Phil said. "She's a good role-model for them."

"OK, that's officially the most disturbing thing I've seen or heard since I got here," Clint said.

"Thank you."

"So what's the plan today, sir?" Clint asked after a short pause.

Phil pushed aside his plate of half-eaten eggs and regarded a piece of floppy, anaemic toast with a resigned expression.

"I think we're at the mercy of Tony Stark, unfortunate as that thought is," Phil said. "Until he can work out how the device that brought us here works and how to send us back, we're trapped."

A disturbance across the room caught Clint's eye and suddenly Stark, Romanov and Coulson all put their hands to their ears for a moment and then stood up and left with their breakfasts unfinished. Clint gestured towards them with his coffee cup and Phil nodded briefly. They left their plates and hurried after them, catching up just as they entered a stairwell.

Coulson took the stairs at a run, but Stark and Romanov turned to block the way up.

"Is something wrong?" Phil asked.

Stark looked uncomfortable and even Romanov's composure seemed less steady than they used to.

"Nothing that concerns you," she said briefly.

"You know, whenever I get told that something doesn't concern us and people make a really good try at blocking us out," Clint said, "that usually means it concerns us."

Stark winced.

Phil crossed his arms and raised an eyebrow.

"They'll find out anyway," Stark said. "Might as well tell them ourselves rather than letting them overhear it at the water cooler."

"We don't have a water cooler," Romanov said.

"It's a metaphorical water cooler and it's not the point," Stark said.

Clint knew how Natasha thought, could read her face better than almost anyone, so he could see when her duplicate made a decision. She jerked her head towards the stairs and began running ahead.

"The other you has been spotted, Barton," she said.

"The other..."

A thought crossed Clint's mind, almost making him stumble as he ran up the stairs just ahead of Phil and Stark.

"No," he said. "No fucking way."

"Yeah, so we might have forgotten to mention," Stark said. "In this world, you got vamped a few months ago."


	4. Chapter 4

  
[](http://s926.photobucket.com/albums/ad105/sian1359/covers%20and%20frontispieces/?action=view&current=mbb2hawk.jpg)   


"So, the other me," Clint said casually. "I'm a vampire here. Am I a really awesome vampire?"

The truck that they were travelling in lurched and Clint winced as Phil slid down the bench seat and landed against him. Normally that would have been fun, but wearing body armour it just hurt.

Romanov, seated opposite, raised an eyebrow. "Are you...an awesome vampire?"

Clint shrugged. "Scale of Edward to Angelus, where does vampire me rank?"

"I am becoming deeply concerned about your reference base," Phil said.

Clint ignored him with great dignity.

"Well, vampires here don't sparkle," Romanov said with a small grin, "so the vampire you ranks higher than Edward."

"But not quite at an Angelus level," Clint said. "That's kind of a relief, from the body count side of things."

"Your...his conversion happened during an attack on the tower," Romanov said. "It was before we got the heavy-duty body armour. He realised what was happening immediately and made us confine him. Three weeks ago, he escaped."

"I'm impressed that you kept him that long," Phil said.

Clint grinned at the backhanded compliment on his escapology skills.

"We still don't know how he escaped," Romanov said. "There was a twenty-four hour watch on him and I haven't been able to find a weakness in the cells yet."

"He had months to work at it," Clint said. "There's always a weakness."

"What do you plan to do with him if you can take him alive?" Phil asked.

"Stark designed something new," Romanov said. "Hopefully it will hold him for a while."

"And after that?"

The truck stopped and Romanov shook her head. "Masks on."

Clint hated wearing gas masks even more than he hated wearing heavy fatigues and body armour. This world was just filled with things that he hated. He pulled on the mask anyway, fastened on his helmet and did the check each other over thing with Phil to make sure that they were as protected as possible. Around him, Romanov and the other soldiers they had brought were doing the same thing. There were two clicks his ear and he signalled that his radio was working.

It was a simple plan because those were the ones with the lowest screw-up potential. His vampire alternate was holed up in an old warehouse with possibly two or three others, nobody had an exact count, and it was already surrounded when they arrived.

Daylight was going to be painful but not completely debilitating for the vampires and Clint was sort of relieved that there was little chance of his vampire duplicate suffering an accidental incendiary death. On the other hand, that made tackling vampires just a little bit more difficult.

Clint and Phil joined Romanov and Coulson at the main entrance. At Coulson's signal, gas canisters were shot through the windows and for a long moment there was silence inside. Then something roared, the sound almost feral, and that was followed by a loud metallic crash.

There was the sound of two dozen rifles being readied and Coulson gave the order for everyone to go in.

The warehouse was mostly empty and looked as though it had been abandoned for months. The gas from the canisters was still heavy in the air, a thick mist of it, but Clint could make out a partially collapsed tower of scaffolding and shapes moving around.

"Remember, this is tag and bag if you can," Romanov said tersely. "Lethal force as a last resort only."

Clint followed Romanov and Coulson through the fog, aware of Phil at his back, and bit back his usual commentary. His rifle was loaded with tranquilliser darts and Phil's gun contained live ammo, just in case. The air in his mask tasted of rubber and sweat and he had to consciously slow his breathing because gas masks always made him want to breathe too fast.

They had only gone a few steps into the building when something screeched and there was suddenly a weight on his back. He could feel something scrabbling at the body armour trying to find a leverage point. There was cursing behind him just as the creature attempted to bite at the thick padding around his neck. He tried to reach back and club his assailant with his rifle but it was too quick for him.

"Hold still!" Phil ordered and a moment later the weight was gone.

Clint whirled around in time to see Phil shoot the vampire twice in the shoulder, which made it snarl and try to lurch upright. The range was point-blank and Clint's tranquilliser dart hit it in the neck, perfectly targeted. For a moment it seemed to fight off the effects, trying to roll over and stagger to its feet. Phil shot it in the leg, it went down and this time it stayed down.

"Are you OK?" Phil asked.

Adrenaline was still surging but Clint could already feel his heart starting to slow. He reached up and fingered the torn material at his neck, but the vampire hadn't been able to penetrate all the way through.

"I'm fine," he confirmed.

The gas began to clear quickly with the doors open and after a couple of minutes the only things moving in the warehouse were SHIELD soldiers.

"Got a body over here," a voice called over the comm. "Definitely dead, looks like they've been feeding."

"Got another one over here," another voice said.

"There's a vamp under the scaffolding," a third voice said. "Neck's broken."

"Is it alive?" Coulson asked.

There was a brief pause. "Yes, sir."

"I'll take care of it," Romanov said, jogging towards the scaffolding.

The vampire that Clint and Phil had taken down was female, young, and her sleeping face was filled with innocence. He nudged her gently and she didn't move.

"I've got Barton," someone said over the comm. "He's alive."

***

"It's fascinating," Doctor Banner said enthusiastically. "His body temperature is actually several degrees lower than normal. I've never seen anything like it."

He was crouching over the vampire version of Barton, who was still unconscious after being transported from the warehouse. Phil watched warily, although he had been assured that Doctor Banner was safe from harm for now. Apparently the good thing about the vampire conversion process was that they could recover from almost everything, including doses of tranquilliser that would be lethal in anyone else. The new cell that had been designed for Barton's vampire double was in its own room on the fifth floor, higher than any vampires had penetrated during their attempted raids on the tower, and it appeared to be a clear box that opened on one side. Stark had described all the extra security installed - including a nasty force-field that would be activated as soon as Doctor Banner was out - and Phil hoped it would be enough.

He watched the man lying in the cell. If his world's Barton had suddenly developed a taste for ankle length leather coats, a goatee and what looked like eyeliner but Phil wasn't getting close enough to check, they would have been identical.

It was a disturbing thought.

Phil vaguely remembered old jokes about doubles with goatees being evil in shows like Star Trek but it was hard to reconcile that idea with Barton, either Barton.

In his sleep the vampire Barton looked, if not innocent, at least not evil. Phil had trouble believing that Barton could ever look completely innocent even in his sleep and there had been plenty of chances to see him sleeping during long missions together. There was too much mischief in his Barton's expressions. Not that Phil had deliberately watched him, but sometimes when sleep refused to come Phil found his eyes drawn to make sure that Barton was resting. That's what he always told himself, anyway.

There had been two bodies in the warehouse, both completely drained of blood, and the other Barton's mouth had been stained red until Coulson gently wiped it clean. It an image that would haunt Phil's mind for months, he was certain. It was the one thing convincing him that the Barton in the cell wasn't the one he knew.

"I'll start analysing the samples immediately," Doctor Banner said. "With a live sample of the virus, I should be able to make progress much faster."

"Just be careful with those," Coulson cautioned.

Doctor Banner placed the final vial of blood into a case with an airtight seal and lock. The needle he had been using went into another locked box marked for the incinerator and he picked them both up carefully. Although he was wearing full protective gear, it had been impossible to wear the thick gloves that everyone else wore in the room. Instead he had been working in thinner rubber gloves that he assured everyone were what scientists wore while handling viruses like Ebola. There had been a soldier with a hand on the button that would lock down the cell the entire time anyway. Phil hoped their precautions would be enough.

"I'll get them right back to the lab," Doctor Banner said. "You'll know as soon as I have anything."

"Thank you, Doctor," his double said.

Doctor Banner stepped away from the cell and at a nod from Coulson, it was locked down. The door swung shut with a barely audible 'snick' and Phil felt something buzzing in the air that had to be the force-field activating.

Two soldiers accompanied Doctor Banner as he left the room with his precious burden and several more filed out, presumably to take up stations along the corridor leading to this room. Four stayed, one in each corner, and Coulson crossed his arms across his chest and took up a watching stance.

"Are you staying all night?" Phil asked, trying to pretend that he wasn’t concerned.

His double shrugged. "Until he's awake, anyway."

"Can I get you some coffee?" Phil offered.

"Sure, why not. I'm not going to be sleeping any time soon."

***

Clint had opted not to follow everyone to the cells. It was weird to see someone who looked exactly like him, could have been him with other choices, lying in a cell. The smears of blood around the vampire's mouth had been a bit creepier than he could cope with.

He had enough bodies on his conscience.

Instead he watched everything on cameras from a small room two floors away. He saw Banner collect the blood samples and watched Phil slip out not long after. There were several camera angles and Clint brought up the one where he could see Coulson's expression. He was a mixture of angry and worried, with a hint of coldness that Clint had never seen in his version of the man. He couldn't quite understand, not yet, but he had a feeling that the vampire version of him had hurt this Coulson in some way.

It made something tighten in his chest for a moment and Clint swallowed down a bitter taste.

There was a brief knock on the door and Natasha peeked in, smiling when she saw him and holding out a steaming mug.

"Thought you could use something," she said. "There's some kind of meatloaf surprise in the canteen for supper but I didn't think you were in the mood for that much surprise."

Clint accepted the mug and took a sip, grimacing at the burnt coffee taste. "There's surprise and there's meatloaf surprise. Good call, Nat."

"How are they doing down there?"

"Banner has his samples," Clint said. "That's their Coulson down there, ours just left and are you finding this as weird as I am?"

"Probably." Natasha frowned. "Am I really as much of a stone-faced bitch as the other me?"

"I caught you smiling the other day," Clint said solemnly. "Might have been gas but-"

Natasha's elbow connected with his ribs sharply.

"Seriously, Tasha, you've got nothing to worry about. The other you isn't that bad when she loosens up a bit. She's like you five years ago, not you now."

"So I used to be a stone-faced bitch but now I've improved." Natasha looked oddly pleased.

Clint shrugged. "At least your lookalike didn't get turned into a blood-sucking fiend. You're still coming out ahead."

"I'd be a great blood-sucking fiend."

"You'd be a terrifying blood-sucking fiend," Clint said. "It's probably a good thing that this world's you is still mostly you. The quarantine wouldn't have lasted five minutes if you'd been turned."

"I heard that the other you got bitten trying to protect Coulson," Natasha said with a carefully blank expression. "And then he insisted on being locked up before the conversion was complete so that he didn't hurt anyone."

"And then he escaped and probably killed at least two people that we know of. I don't think he's exactly a saint right now."

There were few people in the world that Natasha voluntarily touched outside of mission parameters. Clint strongly suspected that her internal list of people who were allowed to get inside her personal boundaries was limited to him and Coulson.

Natasha wrapped an arm around his waist and rested her head against his shoulder. "Clint, don’t."

"Don't what?"

"Don't take on his crap."

"Am I that obvious?"

Natasha pinched him just under the ribs. "You aren't responsible for what he's done any more than you were responsible for what you did when Loki had you. And you know how much I hate it when you try to blame yourself for that."

"My bruised and aching ribs remember." Clint sighed. "Think they'll be able to turn him back?"

"Bruce does," Natasha said. "And speaking of, I should get back to the lab."

"That's where you've been hiding?"

"Someone has to keep an eye on him," she said, "and the last time you were in his lab in our world, things broke."

"One time. I broke something one time."

"You can't resist picking stuff up," Natasha said. "It's a really bad habit in a lab filled with breakable and very expensive things. I'll keep an eye on Bruce, you should get some sleep."

"You know, you and your duplicate have one thing in common," Clint said as they left the observation room. "You're both bossy mother hens."

"It's a good thing I like you, otherwise I'd point out that you and your duplicate both take stupid risks to protect Coulson."

***

The door silently swung shut behind Phil and he hesitated, weighing the cups of coffee in his hands against the tension in the room. His double was standing close to the cell with his arms folded and an expression on his face that Phil couldn't quite read. Or maybe didn't want to read was a more accurate assessment. There was too much in his eyes, thoughts that Phil recognised in himself but hadn't worked out how to process yet.

In the cage, Barton's double was starting to wake up. Phil took an involuntary step forward and stopped. They were so alike and yet completely different. There was definitely eyeliner around Barton's eyes and Phil was torn between a firm conviction that his version would never wear that and the traitorous voice in his head that pointed out the way it highlighted the blue in Barton's eyes when they opened.

There was a sweet smile on the vampire's face as he looked up and only someone who had known either version for a long time would have spotted that the smile didn't show past his lips. Phil swallowed convulsively but stayed quiet.

"Hey, Phil," Barton said.

Coulson unfolded his arms and crouched beside the cell. "Hello."

Barton's voice was gentle, hesitant. "What happened? I don't reme-"

"Cut the act, Barton," Coulson said with a barely suppressed snort. "I'm not falling for it."

Barton shrugged and the smile changed, became dangerous and seductive. "Worth a try. Do you really still think you can turn me back?"

"I have to hope."

Barton crawled closer to the cell wall, his body fluid and easy. It was intensely sexual and creepily repulsive all at once and Phil couldn't tear his eyes away, or stop himself wondering what he'd do if it was his version.

"You know, it doesn't hurt," Barton said with a sly smile. "Just a little bite, I can make it good for you. You know I can."

"You were really much more seductive when you were spilling wine on my good shirt and shooting my paperwork," Coulson said.

"When I was human." Barton's tone was disgusted.

Coulson smiled crookedly. "What can I say? I'm a bit old-fashioned that way."

Phil shifted uncomfortably, torn between announcing his presence and retreating. There were personal moments and then there was...this. In a few sentences their entire relationship had been laid bare. It was confirmation that they'd had something together that Phil had been trying not to think about or want for months and now the vampire was twisting into something corrupt and vile.

"I won't be staying long," Barton said. "All your force-fields, all your locks...do you really think you can keep me here forever?"

"I think that I can keep you here for long enough," Coulson said grimly. "We've got help now, we'll fix this."

"Really?" Barton drawled. "How very interesting."

"You're not going to hurt anyone else, I promise."

"That's very touching, really, I'm sure that I'll be very touched when you've made me all better." Barton suddenly stiffened and then he slowly turned to look at Phil. "Now that's unexpected."

Pinned under the Barton's intense gaze, Phil felt his heart pound in his chest. He told himself firmly that this wasn't his Barton, that the amused expression and explicitly sensual poses were nothing that his Barton was capable of but he knew that it was a lie. There would be kindness in his eyes, though, and it was the lack of compassion in Barton's eyes that enabled Phil to take a deep breath and look away from his face.

Coulson turned and Phil held up the cups in his hands, hoping his voice was steadier than he felt. "Coffee."

"I've never really seen the appeal of the twins thing," Barton said with a wide smirk. "Until now."

"I, ah," Phil said intelligently.

Different as they were, apparently both Bartons had the ability to derail Phil's thought patterns with carefully worded taunts. His Barton wasn't usually as lushly sexual, though, and Phil could easily understand why his double preferred the human version.

Shaking his head tiredly, Coulson stood and moved away from the cage. "The scientists assure me it's the changes in his brain chemistry."

Barton also stood and he posed provocatively, which appeared to be the vampire's default setting. "He's lying."

"The twins thing, Barton?" Coulson said. "You would really have said that before?"

"Maybe not." A grin. "But I would definitely have been thinking it."

"How did you get out?" Coulson asked.

"It's driving you crazy, isn't it? Not knowing, second-guessing yourself." Barton stepped closer to the cage wall and stretched out a finger, wincing as the force-field zapped. "OK, this might be a bit more challenging. I assume this is Stark's work."

"You chose to stay," Coulson said flatly. "All those months, you chose to stay in that cell and you could have got out any time."

Barton shrugged. "You've known me how many years? Of course I chose to stay. I worked out how to get out of that cell an hour after you locked me into it."

"Why?"

"I had nowhere else to be." The smirk returned. "And there was always the chance that you and I would pick up where we left off before."

"Barton," Coulson said with a tired, frustrated glare, "you're going to regret a lot of things when you're back to normal. Try not to make that any worse than it already is."

He opened the door and gestured Phil out, nodding to the soldiers that remained on guard. Phil held out a cup of coffee again when they were in the corridor and even though it was now lukewarm, Coulson drank down half in one gulp and sighed appreciatively.

There was a long silence.

"So, you and Barton?" Phil asked eventually.

His double shrugged and slumped against the wall tiredly. "We were getting there. You and your one?"

"No. I don't know if he-"

"He does," Coulson said quickly. "I've seen the way he looks at you and I recognise it. Mine used to...well, I recognise it."

Phil stared down into the dregs of his coffee. "Did you start it?"

Coulson snorted. "That would have been inappropriate. No, I waited and hoped and then one day he kissed me in my - our - office and asked me out to dinner. Then the evacuation alarms went off and we never managed to get enough time to do anything about it. A few weeks later he was infected."

"I'm sorry," Phil said, feeling like the words were pitiful in the face of that confession.

"It is what it is." He sighed. "Piece of advice? Don't let things fester. You never know when they'll do something intensely stupid and get turned into a vampire."

***

Whenever the question came up in media interviews, Clint always said that his superpower was napping. It came in useful in the world-saving business because sometimes a full night's sleep became a much missed memory.

The barrack-style room that he, Banner and Phil had been assigned was uncomfortable and cold, with rock hard cots for beds and no privacy thanks to the small window in the door. It seemed like a poor design choice in a tower that could be overrun by vampires at any moment but Clint figured that if the vampires got this far, sheltering in a dorm was going to be a pretty poor plan anyway.

His nap was interrupted by the door opening and he was instantly awake. Although the only light source came from the corridor, the silhouette was familiar and Clint was positive that it was Phil in the doorway, not Coulson. He was learning that there was something slightly different in the way they each held themselves. Coulson always looked tired, as though he was carrying a massive weight on his shoulders.

"Everything OK?" he asked, sitting up.

Phil's face was shadowed so Clint couldn't see his expression but there was more tension than usual in his posture. He waited for Phil to say or do something, but nothing happened and Clint started to worry.

He stood slowly and took a careful step forward. "Important question here, given where we are. Are you a vampire, sir?"

There was no reply but Phil seemed to make a decision and moved forward to close the distance between them, letting the door shut with a quiet click.

Clint froze in place as Phil cupped his face and kissed him.


	5. Chapter 5

For the rest of his life, Clint suspected that his biggest regret would be his reaction to Phil's kiss.

He was too busy processing a hundred scattered thoughts to remember that the appropriate response was to kiss Phil back, so he stood there and Phil kissed him and it was all incredibly awkward.

Phil pulled back and dropped his hands, his face carefully blank so that Clint could not read him.

"I guess that answers that, then," he said and started towards the door.

"What? Wait."

Clint's higher brain functions unfroze and he hurried after Phil, half-afraid that he was too late and half-terrified that he was about to make a huge mistake. Phil had his hand on the door when Clint reached him, obviously intent on leaving before things could get any worse. No clever words magically appeared in Clint's mind so he went with what had always worked best over the years: action.

He caught Phil's arm, spun him around and crowded him against the wall. A pause, checking that there was nothing dangerous in Phil's eyes, and then Clint lurched forward to kiss him.

It wasn't a great kiss, their teeth clashed and Clint's lips were too dry and they barely avoided crashing noses together, but it seemed to get the intent across. Clint pulled back, surprised to find that he was breathless.

"Hi," he said, because really, what was the appropriate to say after something like this?

"Hi," Phil said, apparently feeling just as eloquent.

"Not that I'm complaining, believe me I'm not," Clint said, "but what was that about?"

For a long, terrifying moment Phil said nothing. Clint couldn't read him and he was starting to worry that maybe Phil was rethinking kissing him already and everything was going to go badly wrong before he'd even had a chance to fuck things up. A smile started to pull at the corners of Phil's mouth and Clint released the breath he hadn't even realised he was holding.

"I was taking some advice," Phil said.

"How's that working out for you?"

"I'm not sure yet. I think that I need more data."

Clint grinned. "I can do that."

This time everything was much smoother. Clint reached up to carefully trace the line of Phil's jaw with one finger and then he leaned forward and met Phil in a gentle kiss, both of them cautious and careful at first until they understood each other's rhythm. It felt good, better than good, and Clint pressed closer to feel Phil's body against his. He groaned quietly when Phil's tongue flicked against his lips, opening immediately to let him in. Phil's hands were on his back, pulling him closer, and then one hand moved down to his ass and Clint definitely approved of the way things were going.

Phil was pressed back against the wall with no room for Clint get an arm around him, so he had to settle for wrapping one hand around the back of Phil's neck to keep him in place while Clint scrabbled at the heavy fatigue jacket, trying to find skin.

Clint cursed internally because the thick jumpsuit under the jacket seemed an impenetrable barrier. He bit and sucked at Phil's lower lip, grinning as he felt a low moan rumbling in Phil's chest. This was better than Clint had imagined and he had imagined a lot, always pushing away the idea because it was impossible and he refused to obsess about something he couldn’t have.

Phil tore away, breathing hard, and said, "We shouldn't, not here."

"Right," Clint said as he kissed Phil's jaw. "Absolutely. Wrong timing completely. We should talk about this. Back home. Before we do anything else."

"Exactly."

Clint thought that Phil would be a bit more believable on the whole waiting, bad timing plan if his hand hadn't still been on Clint's ass and he hadn't started nuzzling just under Clint's ear. Clint shivered and tightened his grip on Phil's hip.

A loud klaxon began sounding just as their lips touched again.

Clint dropped his head to Phil's shoulder and groaned. "Saved by the bell."

"Later," Phil promised. "We'll pick this up later."

"Count on it."

***

Phil had a bad feeling as soon as he realised that the source of the alarm was the lab.

The lab where Banner had been working for the last two days on a cure for the vampire virus. Nothing good ever came out of these scenarios.

His hands itched for a gun as he ran towards it, Barton on his heels. Although Phil agreed with the logic of keeping guns out of the hands of unexpected guests outside of combat situations - he would make the same call if their situations were reversed - that didn't make him any happier about being defenceless.

The doors were wide open and Phil skidded to a stop as soon as he got through them. Barton swore softly as he nearly ran into Phil and had to put out a hand to steady himself so that he didn’t fall onto the soldiers kneeling just inside the doorway, their rifles up and ready to take a shot.

It looked like a hurricane had torn through the lab. Equipment lay on the floor surrounded by shards of shattered glass. One bench had been torn from its bolts and thrown against the glass that divided the room in two.

Thankfully that glass had held. On the other side of the glass stood Doctor Banner, still human and clad in a blue hazmat suit with a line snaking out of the back and up to the ceiling. It was a level four containment, Phil could see that instantly, and he shuddered to think what would have happened if that had been breached. Doctor Banner was alone and Phil could see the strain on his face through the face plate.

The source of the devastation stood in the middle of the lab and Phil's breath caught in his chest.

Barton's double smirked and pulled Agent Romanov closer, one arm tight around her throat and the other holding a scalpel against her ribs. Her unmarred face was white and she was bleeding from her nose. As Phil watched the vampire warily, he realised with a start that he hated this creature who wore Clint's face. It was easy to separate them now: Clint was the man who had kissed him with such cautious passion only a few minutes ago. Barton was seductive and beautiful but filled with fury and cruelty.

"Guess you couldn't keep me long enough after all," Barton said triumphantly.

There was a disturbance behind Phil and then Coulson pushed him aside gently so he could face Barton, arms crossed and a sad expression on his face.

"I guess not," Coulson said. "I'm sorry, Barton, I really am."

"Fuck you," Barton said angrily.

"Let Agent Romanov go," Coulson said.

Barton rolled his eyes. "Even if this one was our Natasha, do you actually think that would work?"

"I had to try."

"That's you all over, isn't it? Trying and never getting." Barton's expression was cruelly happy. "Well, it's been great, and I really enjoyed our little chats, but I've got what I came for so it's time for me to get going."

What happened next was a blur. Barton ducked his head to Agent Romanov's neck and she cried out. There was blood around Barton's mouth when he looked up and he licked it away with a smirk even as he shoved her away. His leather coat flared around him as he covered the distance to the window in two massive leaps. Then the window was shattering, glass flying everywhere, and Barton was through and falling.

Phil, Coulson and Clint were at the window a moment later. They watched as Barton quickly rappelled down the side of the building from a line fastened to the window frame, landed neatly and then fled, melting into the shadows of the street.

Coulson swore and punched the wall before turning to slump against it. Phil wondered just how far Barton had to go before Coulson could give up on him.

"Stark assured me that cage would hold him," Coulson said, looking defeated.

Clint stepped closer and put a hand on Coulson's arm. "I don't think anything was going to hold him long."

It was a supportive gesture that Phil had received more times than he could count and there was nothing in Clint's eyes other than simple concern. It still made something irrational burn inside him and Phil had to remind himself that if he could separate Clint and his double, then Clint must surely have done the same. Clint had to have known that it was Phil he was kissing only minutes before.

"Uh, guys?" Doctor Banner had moved closer to the glass divider, his face worried as he pointed. "You've got a bigger problem."

Agent Romanov was curled in a foetal position, her shoulders shaking. There was blood on the floor, dripping from the dozens of cuts where her hands had been lacerated by the broken glass around her.

More blood trickled from her neck.

"Oh, fuck," Clint whispered. "Tasha, no."

He started towards her and Phil grabbed his arm to restrain him.

"Jesus fuck, I hate this place," Clint said.

Agent Romanov looked up at them. There was a thin sheen of sweat on her pale face and her eyes looked reddened.

"He bit me," she said softly. “That bastard bit me.”

There was a rattle as the SHIELD soldiers raised their rifles and aimed at her. Coulson's gun was already in his hands and Phil's hands itched again for the cold, solid feel of his own sidearm.

"How long do I have?" Agent Romanov asked.

Coulson shrugged. "Maybe two hours."

"How long before I stop being me?"

"Less than that."

"Tie me up," she ordered. "Tight as you can. Shoot me up with whatever you've got, keep me sedated. Any tests you want to run, I'm giving you permission."

"I can't do it," Coulson said. "Too much risk of contamination. You're covered in blood."

"I can," the other Agent Romanov said, stepping into the room.

She was dressed in full gear, armour over heavy fatigues, helmet in place and every bit of her skin covered. She wore heavy rubber gloves in place of her combat gloves and she was pulling out a dozen cable ties as she approached Agent Romanov.

"Thank you," Agent Romanov said, looking relieved.

The other woman crouched, glass crunching under her boots. "I'd ask for the same thing in your position."

A small smile of gratitude appeared on Agent Romanov's face for a moment and then she shuddered.

"Painful?" her double asked as she briskly tied Agent Romanov's wrists.

"Nothing I can't handle."

Giving the ties a final tug to make sure they were tight, the other Agent Romanov stood and moved towards a cabinet, sorting through the drawers efficiently.

"Clint?" Agent Romanov said. "Remember what you promised?"

"We'll fix this, Nat," Clint said and Phil knew them both well enough to know what the promise would be.

"I know that you'll try," she said, her voice rasping a little. "But if you can't, if you have to make a call..."

"I'll make it clean," Clint said. "Promise."

"Thank you."

The other Agent Romanov slid several syringes into her pocket and gestured to the armed SHIELD men. "I need two ahead of us, three behind. Aim for the head if she breaks free."

Then she gently helped Agent Romanov to stand, supported her for a moment and led her out of the room with their guard.

He wasn't aware of it but at some stage Phil's grip on Clint's arm had changed from restraining to comforting. He felt Clint draw in a shaky breath, hold it and release. Phil met Clint's eyes for a moment, asking without saying anything and getting a nod in return. He clasped Clint's arm tightly for a moment and then moved away to stand by the glass divider.

"Doctor Banner?" he asked. "How are things going in here?"

"Aside from the rampaging vampires?" Doctor Banner said with a bitter twist to his lips. "Oh, just fine."

"What's your progress?" Coulson asked as he approached.

"Well, the good news is that I think I know how they made the virus," Doctor Banner said with a slight shrug. "Gamma radiation again."

"Does that mean you can make an antidote?" Coulson asked.

"Maybe," Banner said. "That's the thing about gamma radiation, it's never as simple as it looks. I know how an antidote should work and I can manufacture that, but whether it will actually work? Your guess is as good as mine."

"Just do your best," Phil said. "We've got some time."

Coulson suddenly straightened and pressed a finger to his ear, frowning at whatever was coming through the comms. Phil knew that expression, had probably worn it more often than he cared to remember, and he felt his heart sink.

"You two, with me," Coulson ordered. "Doctor Banner, a team will be along to clear this mess soon. For now, it's a biohazard so I'd appreciate it if you didn't leave your lab. If you need anything, anything at all, let the team know and they'll bring it to you."

"Thank you, Agent Coulson," Doctor Banner said, his focus already returning to his work.

"What's wrong?" Phil asked as he followed Coulson out of the lab with Clint.

"Director Fury is calling in," Coulson said. "It's not going to be good news."

***

Clint whistled under his breath as they arrived in the communication room. One glance around showed him where all the effort had gone in finishing the tower after the labs and cells. In contrast to the dingy, half-finished look of everything else the comm room was bright, shiny and filled with the latest high-tech toys.

This was also where a lot of the staff appeared to be. The room was lined with workstations and screens, all staffed and on a quick stock take Clint recognised feeds from a dozen news stations around the world, several international agencies and multiple satellite feeds. A huge screen on the far wall dominated the room and Clint flinched slightly at the ten-foot tall Director Fury glaring down at everyone.

"Coulson, at last," Fury said, sounding more bad tempered than Clint had ever heard him before and that really took some doing. "Care to explain why there are two of you and why Barton is wandering the comm room rather than locked up somewhere?"

"It was in a memo yesterday," Coulson said mildly. "I flagged it urgent."

"So were seventy other memos. Do you have any idea how much paperwork lands on my desk every day?"

"Yes, sir," Coulson said and Clint grinned because this was exactly like watching Phil and Fury bicker back home. "Perhaps we need a priority higher than urgent."

"Like nobody would abuse that, either. Go ahead, explain what the fuck is going on over there."

"Stark thinks they're from some kind of alternate universe. They arrived with a device that Stark is still trying to figure out. Apparently it was built by a man called Doctor Doom and I'd advise that we put a watch on that name."

Fury sighed tiredly. "That's all we need. A spare Barton and a second you. The World Security Council has finally made the call. You've got six hours as of right now to bug out and then Manhattan and every other city with a vampire population becomes a radioactive wasteland."

"Sir, we can't break the quarantine," Coulson said firmly.

"You're breaking the quarantine," Fury said. "I'm not losing my best agents over this."

"May I ask why they've suddenly agreed to this? Last week Russia and China were still abstaining."

"Remember those rumours of an outbreak in northern China? Looks like they weren't just rumours. It's a stupid-ass decision but it's out of my hands now."

Coulson frowned. "Barton and the other me aren't the only duplicates here. They brought another Agent Romanov and a Doctor Banner with them."

"As in, Doctor Bruce Banner? Guy who is even more reckless than Stark and committed suicide by stupidity and overdeveloped sense of responsibility? That Bruce Banner?"

"Yes," Coulson said. "But he's got experience with the super soldier serum. More experience than anyone else here that isn't already infected. He's already worked out how they manufactured the virus so he might be able to create some kind of antidote to it."

"Get the man out of there," Fury said. "Bring Stark, bring their device, whatever it takes but get Banner out of there before the nukes arrive. He can pick things up at the CDC."

"There's a complication," Coulson said. "Their Agent Romanov has been infected."

"And with all due respect," Phil added, "we're not leaving here without her."

"The hell you aren't," Fury said. “You’re getting out of there now.”

"I'm not leaving either," Coulson said. "Agent Romanov has offered to be a guinea pig for any cure that Doctor Banner might develop."

"And you're not leaving Barton," Fury said tiredly. "I get it."

Coulson and Phil wore matching obstinate expressions and Clint grinned at them because for the first time, they actually looked like the identical men they were supposed to be.

"Fine," Fury said. "I'll try to stall but I can't promise anything. Assume you've got six hours and then you're shit out of luck."

"I'll keep you updated on our progress," Coulson promised. "If we can't leave in time..."

"Send me everything you've got if that happens," Fury said. "Just don't send any damn memos."


	6. Chapter 6

Clint watched Natasha. He was not alone: Romanov had pulled a stool up several feet from the large clear cell and she held a rifle across her lap. She had taken off her helmet and it was on the floor beside her but that was her only concession to comfort. There would be no second chances this time, no opportunity for escape if Natasha miraculously woke up from the huge dose of sedatives.

The cell itself was still intact. Clint had to admit that he slightly admired his vampiric doppelganger for escaping without damaging it. He couldn’t see how he had done it and he wasn’t about to get inside to find out, but apparently vampire superpowers were pretty amazing.

Not that Clint was in any hurry to find out for himself. Despite the sedatives, Natasha still twitched and growled in her sleep and her face sometimes contorted in pain. The conversion process looked pretty nasty.

The door opened and a moment later Phil was at his side, holding out a cup of coffee. Clint accepted it gratefully and was even more grateful for the way that Phil’s fingers touched his as he took the cup.

"How's Banner doing?" Clint asked quietly.

Phil shrugged. "Working."

They watched in silence for a while, Phil standing so close that his shoulder brushed against Clint's.

A knock at the door interrupted the vigil. It opened and Stark looked through and gestured to them. Romanov ignored him, her eyes never wavering from Natasha’s still form. Stark gestured more urgently and Clint glanced at Phil, who shrugged and made a "might as well" sort of gesture as he headed for the door. Stark made a beeline for the stairwell as soon as they were out of the room.

"What's happened now?" Phil asked as they began running down the stairs.

"I've figured out your reality jumping machine," Stark said. "Well, mostly figured out."

"Mostly?" Clint asked.

Stark ignored them and continued down the stairs, stopping in front of a door three floors down and keying in a code. The door swung open and they followed him into his workshop. It looked a lot like his workshop in their own world. Machine parts and circuits littered the benches and there were multiple versions of the Iron Man suit around the walls. It was darker, though, as if Stark was trying to save power by keeping the workshop dimmer and no holograms appeared as Stark walked through. Only one bot sat in the corner and Clint recognised Dummy.

"What happened to You and Butterfingers?" he asked.

"You know my bots?" Stark asked then slapped himself. "Of course he knows my bots, he knows the other me who didn't get halfway through moving his stuff here and then have half the world go batshit around him."

"Focus, Stark," Phil said.

"Has that ever worked for you with me?" Stark asked.

Phil shrugged. "I live in hope."

"That's what I like about you, always so hopeful." Stark paused. "And ready with a Taser. They didn't let you have a Taser here, did they?"

There was a twitch at the corners of Phil's mouth that Clint knew was his equivalent to a full-bodied smirk. Stark gave a pained sigh and led the way towards the machine that had caused so many problems. It had been a couple of days since Clint had last seen it and it didn't look any less complex or any less crazy.

"Is there any chance people were shooting things around this?" Stark asked.

"There was a fire fight, yes," Phil said.

"Yeah, you might want to avoid shooting things around fragile technology," Stark said. "For future reference."

"We'll keep that in mind."

Stark pointed at a spot on the side of the machine where there was a definite hole in a piece of metal. "That? Is probably why you're here instead of wherever your Doctor Doom guy was aiming for. Fried some of the circuits, you're lucky that any of you survived the trip. What was he doing anyway? Trying to use this thing himself or was he trying to send you somewhere? Wait, no, not important right now. You can work it out when you get home. The important thing is that you shot his machine."

"Can you repair it?" Phil asked.

"Already done," Stark said. "You have a fully functional world-jumping teleport thing at your service. I also took a few scans, maybe downloaded the programming for it. Hope you don't mind."

"I don't think that I have much choice," Phil said.

Stark shrugged. "No, not really."

"Do you know how to get us home?" Clint asked.

"That's the easy part," Stark said. "Your Doctor Doom seems to assume that all his minions are idiots, which, yeah fair enough, they probably are. No super-villains ever employ minions for their brains. So he installed a home button."

Stark pointed to a large green button with a prominent 'H' printed on it. "Press that and hey presto, you're back on your own world."

One button, it would be that easy. They could go home and leave this world with its vampires and its weirdness and never look back except for one thing.

"We can't go back," Clint said. "We can't leave Natasha here."

"And we can't risk bringing the virus back with us," Phil said tiredly.

The door beeped and opened to admit Coulson, who looked more stressed than Clint had ever seen in either world. "Stark, can you still hack the cameras in SHIELD HQ?"

"Unless someone has found a way to remove my access," Stark said, sitting down at a bench and pulling over a monitor, "of course I can still hack the cameras. I installed the cameras."

"Then do it," Coulson said, moving to stand over Stark's shoulder. "Now."

"Patience, grasshopper," Stark said as his fingers flew across the keyboard that had lit up in the surface of the bench. "I just need a minute. What's got your panties in a knot, anyway?"

"We just had word from one of our patrols," Coulson said. "They saw Barton entering SHIELD HQ a few minutes ago."

"Shit." Stark typed faster.

"I'm almost afraid to ask," Clint said.

Coulson looked up, apparently only just becoming aware that they were standing there. "The virus was first created in a SHIELD lab in our headquarters. Director Fury argued against that from the beginning but he was overruled and it was easier to allow a few scientists and a couple of military liaisons in to do their work rather than continuing to argue."

"Oh no," Phil said.

Clint could see where this was going as well and he agreed with Phil's assessment.

"That's why we're based here rather than in headquarters," Coulson said. "We got everyone out that we could when we realised what was happening and we took over this place."

"Over my objections," Stark added, glaring at his monitor. "Son of a...someone has been hacking my hacks. It's going to be another minute. When did they get smart?"

"One of the men attached to the project on the army side was called Emil Blonsky," Coulson continued. "We never did get an explanation for what a Russian was doing there. He was one of the first to be infected and we're fairly sure that he's the one responsible for getting several carriers out before we could lock down the city. Now he's the leader of the largest pack in Manhattan and they're based out of SHIELD HQ. I take it you knew Blonsky in your world?"

Phil nodded. "I knew of him. Apparently some patterns never change."

"Barton never approached him the first time he escaped," Coulson said. "We've had patrols watching the building for months. Whatever he wants-"

"We're in," Stark said triumphantly. "I'm searching..."

Fuzzy images appeared on the monitor, flashing past quickly as Stark switched from camera to camera.

"Why didn't they turn off the cameras when they took over the building?" Clint asked.

"They did," Stark said, "but because they're all complete idiots they didn't actually rip them out or destroy them. They just hit the off buttons and do you seriously think I can't work around that? Really, we're being hunted by a pack of utter morons and it's embarrassing. Ah, got you."

The image on the screen was black and white but surprisingly detailed and well-focused. Clint stared at it for a moment and groaned.

"Blonsky watched way too many Hammer horror movies," he said. "It's the cape. Who gets turned into a vampire and actually thinks 'well, now I need a cape to be a real vampire'. At least vampire me is a little less stereotyped."

"Vampire you wears a long leather coat," Phil said. "I wouldn't start claiming originality for him."

"Blonsky's definitely a B-movie category villain," Stark said. "No originality at all. If he hadn't got control of a lot of SHIELD's toys, he wouldn't even be a blip on our radars."

On the screen, Clint's duplicate was flanked by two men who definitely fit the lackey category. Clint clenched his fists and ground his teeth because he couldn't look at the creature without remembering the sickening moment when it bit Natasha. That thing, Barton, seemed perfectly relaxed and Clint hated it. Blonsky stood on a small dais surrounded by several young women wearing adoring expressions and little else. The only element missing from the cliche was the thin layer of mist on the floor, which Clint figured was probably only because SHIELD didn't have a smoke machine.

He could understand Stark's embarrassment about this being their arch-nemesis.

"Can you turn the sound on?" Coulson asked.

Stark typed something and Blonsky's voice suddenly blasted out of speakers around the room.

"-why I shouldn't have you killed," Blonsky was saying.

Clint easily filled in the first part of the sentence. Every cartoon villain used it at some stage.

"I can't believe he said that," he muttered. "Ham."

"I want to cut a deal," Barton said. "I've got information that you're going to want."

Blonsky stepped forward to the edge of his dais. "I'll hear your information."

"There's a price."

"A price," Blonsky repeated. "Name it and I'll consider it."

"Two people," Barton said. "Coulson and Romanov. They're mine."

"And why do you think that price is within my power?"

"Because you'll be leading an assault on the Stark Tower today," Barton said, "and I can make sure you'll succeed."

"Interesting," Blonsky said. "Your arrogance is breath taking but I'm willing to overlook that, if your information is accurate. Very well, you may have your people if they survive."

"I guess that will have to do," Barton said.

"It's the only price I can offer." A nasty smile appeared on Blonsky's face. "I can't guarantee that they will be unharmed. Only alive."

Barton shrugged. "Makes no difference to me."

"So, what's your information?"

"They're going to find an antidote to the virus," Barton said. "They've got a scientist who knows the super soldier program and is an expert in gamma radiation. He's already worked out how the virus was created. It won't take him more than a day or two to find a cure. If you don't attack them today, you'll all be back to happy humanity or dead within a week."

"Impossible," Blonsky said. "All the scientists who might have been able to do it were in this building. I made sure of that."

"Yeah, the scientist doesn't come from this world. Where he comes from, he's the world authority on this stuff."

Blonsky's eyes narrowed. "You've been inside their tower. You know their weaknesses. Tell me how to break through their defences."

"I can do better than that." His face was hidden from the camera but the smile in Barton's voice was easy to hear. "I've got the blueprints and all the codes you'll need on a flash-drive."

"Son of a bitch!" Stark exclaimed. "How the fuck did he get that?"

On the screen, Blonsky smiled. "That is excellent. Excellent indeed. You've earned more than just the price you asked for, I've got a nice little brunette that I'm sure you'll enjoy. Boys, show our guest to the bar."

As arguments erupted behind him, Clint peered closely at the screen. It might have been his imagination, but he was almost certain that Barton looked briefly at the camera as he was led away and the corner of Barton's eye twitched.

***

"Doctor Banner, what do you have?" Phil tried to project calm in his voice despite the rapidly approaching deadlines.

Doctor Banner's face was hard to see through the plastic of his hazmat suit but his voice was easy to read. "Something, maybe. I haven't had time to test it."

"Will it work?" Coulson made no effort to hide his worry. "We're running out of time."

"I don't know." There was a hint of frustration in Doctor Banner's voice. "Maybe. Theoretically it should, but theoretically the virus should never have been able to do what it did and theoretically the Other Guy shouldn't be possible. So I don't know."

"Hey, Bruce," Clint said. "If it doesn't work, no harm no foul. Nat understands."

Phil felt a surge of gratitude for Clint's understanding and attempts to keep Doctor Banner calm, even though it seemed to be fruitless.

"Thanks, but I know what happens if this doesn't work," Doctor Banner said. "I overheard the guys cleaning up out there, I know about the bombs."

"If this doesn't work," Coulson said, "we'll get you and your research out of here. We've still got some time."

Phil had argued with Coulson over telling Banner about the potential vampire raid. It was an odd sensation to literally argue with himself and win. Banner was being kept out of the loop because the last thing they needed was to add more pressure to him. As it everything currently stood, they were probably going to be vaporised before the raid could happen anyway. It wasn't a cheering thought.

"Normally I'd run tests," Doctor Banner said. "At least make sure that it's not going to kill anyone. I don't think we've got the time, though."

"I wish that we did," Phil said at the same time as Coulson said, "No, we don't."

There was a quiet snicker but Clint looked completely serious when Phil looked over at him.

"What's the delivery method?" Coulson asked.

"I've aerosolised it," Doctor Banner said, "and I've prepared a few darts that can deliver it directly into the bloodstream. I thought an airborne version might be more useful for covering an entire city."

"That will be useful," Coulson said. "Is it safe for uninfected people, though?"

"Honestly? I don't know." Doctor Banner shrugged. "Theoretically it shouldn't have any effect unless you're infected and it should only stay active in the air for an hour or two."

"Theoretically."

"It's the best that I can do without extensive testing," Doctor Banner said.

"We'll take it," Coulson said. "At this stage, I don't think we have much choice. Meet us in the cells in twenty minutes."

"Thank you," Phil said quietly, hoping that Doctor Banner understood that it was for more than just developing an antidote for this world.

He honestly wasn't sure what Clint would do if Agent Romanov couldn't be cured. Their friendship was one of the anchors in Clint's life and Phil never wanted to have to find out what Clint would become without her.

Doctor Banner waved at them vaguely, already gathering up supplies and kits and who knew what else.

***

"Hey Nat," Clint said quietly. "I know you probably can't hear me but...they might have something. Stark figured out how to get us home but we're not leaving without you so that's not an option right now. This might not work and it might make things worse, but you know all those times we thought something wouldn't work and it did? I'm hoping this is one of those times."

Natasha was lying in the middle of her cell, so still that only the slight rise and fall of her chest told Clint that she was alive. Her face was so pale that the skin almost looked grey. He hadn't got close enough to Barton to see any details and he had somehow expected her to look less Natasha-like. Apart from the pallor and her unnatural stillness, she could have been asleep.

"Her conversion finished an hour ago," Romanov said, a bitter smile twisting her lips. "They're always less restless after it's finished if you get enough tranqs into them."

"She almost looks normal," Clint said.

"If she was awake, she wouldn't be," Romanov said. "They get pretty snarly when they're first converted. A lot of them never get past that stage."

"Somehow, I expected more teeth."

"Wake her up, go in there without armour and you'll see the teeth." Romanov's scar turned her smile into something a lot more menacing. "We still haven't worked out how they do it."

"Thanks, but no thanks," Clint said. "I'll take your word for it on the teeth."

It was another few minutes before Banner arrived with Phil and Coulson. Clint just watched in silence crouched a couple of feet from the cell. He couldn't shake the feeling that if he did this, if he watched over her, then maybe Banner's cure would work. It was completely illogical but Clint had never pretended to be particularly logical.

Phil went straight to Clint when he arrived and Phil's hand on his shoulder and his nearness were strangely reassuring.

"We'll need to counteract the tranquillisers," Banner said. "If...when her body is back to normal, the dosage in her system will kill her."

"I'll do it," Romanov said immediately.

She already had vials and syringes in the pockets of her suit and she quickly loaded up a syringe before putting on her helmet. There was a long, tense moment as she opened the cell and approached Natasha cautiously. Several extra guards had filed in with Banner and they all stood at alert.

Whatever she injected worked almost immediately. Natasha took a deep, harshly painful breath as Romanov moved away and she was already sitting up when Romanov got out of the cell. Banner threw something inside and Romanov activated the door.

Natasha hurled herself towards the potential escape but the door closed too fast and she was thrown back by the massive shock of the force-field when she hit it. Clint's heart almost skipped a beat but Natasha was up and pacing restlessly with barely a pause.

"How long?" Coulson asked.

Banner shrugged, pulling off the helmet of his hazmat suit with a look of relief. "I set a twenty second timer, just in case."

Natasha spun around and snarled at them and Clint felt sick. The expression on her face was filled with rage, so much fury that she barely looked human. Her pupils had dilated completely and now he could see the teeth, a pair of long incisors that cut her lips as she closed her mouth.

"Teeth," Romanov said, a note of clinical fascination in her voice. "She's very snarly."

"I spotted that," Clint said shakily.

Phil squeezed his shoulder wordlessly, neither of them taking their eyes away from Natasha. It was some kind of grenade that Banner had thrown into the cell and it began hissing softly, a faint mist escaping and making the air in the cell slightly cloudy. Natasha pounced on the grenade with a roar and threw it at the wall but it bounced off harmlessly and continued to pour gas.

She continued pacing and trying to throw or crush the grenade but it was much stronger than it looked. Eventually her movements grew slower and then she slumped to the floor.

"How long will it take?" Phil asked.

"I don't know," Banner said. "Conversion takes two hours. Who knows how long it takes to undo that, if this even works?"

"We've got less than three hours until the bombs hit, Doctor Banner," Phil said.

Clint swallowed hard, trying to push down the fear that was starting to claw at his stomach.

"I just don't know," Banner said. "All we can do is wait. And hope."


	7. Chapter 7

Outside the medical bay Clint could hear the sound of people running up and down corridors, shouting orders and setting up defences. His entire attention was focused on the still form on a gurney, her hair a slash of bright colour against the white sheets and pale skin. He held Natasha's hand tightly and waited.

Phil was standing on the other side of the gurney, looking almost as tense as Clint felt.

"How long did Banner think she'd be out?" Clint asked again.

Phil shrugged. "He had no idea. All he could tell is that her physiology is back to normal and her system seems clear of the virus."

"She's less toothy," Clint said hopefully.

They'd had the same conversation three times since the antidote started to take effect and Clint knew that it was pointless but he kept doing it again anyway.

Eventually Natasha stirred and opened her eyes, squinting a little in the bright light.

"Hi Tasha," Clint said quietly.

Natasha mumbled something he couldn't make out properly and groaned.

"How are you feeling?" Clint asked.

"Like I got run over by a truck," Natasha said. "Maybe after going ten rounds with a Doombot."

Clint chuckled, more from relief than anything else.

"How much do you remember?" Phil asked.

Natasha turned slightly, wincing at the movement, so that she could look at Phil. "Pain. A lot of pain. And feeling incredibly angry."

"You got pretty snarly there," Clint said. "Vampire you is mean."

"Did I hurt anyone?" Natasha asked.

"You were sedated for a lot of it," Phil said. "We had to wake you up before you were given the antidote."

"Thank you." Natasha turned to meet Clint's eyes and he was surprised to see her blink away wetness. "Thank you."

"You know that I'd never leave you like that," Clint said and he felt her squeeze his hand.

"What's going on out there?" Natasha asked.

Clint looked at Phil, who nodded and slipped out of the room.

"Nothing important," Clint said. "You just rest. We'll send Banner in to give you the once over, OK? Then we'll see about getting home."

***

Phil leaned against the wall beside the medical bay door, rubbing his temples where he could feel a headache throbbing. It was probably the combination of stress, lack of sleep and lack of decent caffeine but it was inconvenient. Leaning against the wall kept him out of the way of SHIELD personnel rushing through the corridors and he didn't have anywhere else to go.

Agent Romanov had been through enough today. She didn't need the added stress of what was about to happen as well and she'd guess that something was badly wrong if he went in there now.

The door opened and Clint stepped out, closing it softly behind him. His eyes went to Phil's immediately and Phil could read the concern there.

"Bad news?"

Phil nodded and moved further down the corridor, checking doors until he found an open one. It was a closet filled with cleaning supplies but it was at least empty and private so he wasn't going to look further.

"Natasha?" Phil asked as he closed the door and switched on the light.

"She'll be fine." Clint raised his eyebrows. "Isn't this playing to the stereotype a bit? You, me, a closet?"

It shouldn't have been funny, god knows Phil tried never to encourage Clint's terrible jokes, but it relieved the tension and he had to work harder than normal to swallow his laughter.

"Focus, Barton," he said.

"Focusing," Clint said. "Although...could you maybe avoid the 'B' word until we're out of this hell world? I'm pretty sure that I don't want to be looking for the vampire me every time you say anything to me."

"Noted. Clint. "

Phil was surprised by how easily it rolled off his tongue and the smile that Clint rewarded him with made something in his chest catch and constrict.

"So, what's the news?" Clint leaned back against the door looking exhausted. "I can probably guess, but you may as well tell me anyway."

"There's good news and bad news," Phil said. "The good news is that we may not get nuked any time soon."

"I'm noting the word 'may' and hating this conversation already."

Phil smiled tightly. "Director Fury is working on it. He's meeting with the World Security Council right now."

"That doesn't actually sound reassuring. My definition of good news would be a lot more certain about the lack of nuclear weapons that are supposed to be here in less than an hour." Clint took a deep breath and seemed to drop the subject. "And the bad news?"

"Blonsky's entire vampire pack left the SHIELD building half an hour ago. Barton's with them. They could be here any time now."

"Figures," Clint said. "Is there any chance that we can get out of here before they arrive?"

"Very little. According to Stark, when the device is activated it will send us to exactly the same location in our world and he doesn't know what will happen if there are objects in the way when we arrive. Unless we can precisely plot the location of everything in Stark's workshop on our world and guarantee that Stark hasn't moved anything over the last three days, we can't risk using it."

Clint winced. "Materialising inside one of Stark's bots would be painful."

"That's putting it mildly."

"So we'll need to pick somewhere that we can guarantee will be unoccupied. A big, open space that nobody is going to accidentally walk through at a bad time."

"Exactly."

"Sounds like my shooting range will be our best bet," Clint said.

"That was my conclusion." Phil sighed. "Except that's five floors from where the machine is currently sitting and we've got nobody to help us move it up there. We're stuck in this world for now."

They were silent for a while and Phil watched Clint working through all the possibilities and outcomes. None of their options were good. He knew Clint well enough to know what he would decide but he had always tried to let Clint come to these decisions without influencing him.

"I guess we'll have to help them fight off Blonsky, then, and hope Fury talks the Council round," Clint said eventually. "Seems like our best chance of getting home, after all."

"That was my thought."

"What did you tell Agent Coulson?"

Phil shrugged. "That we'd help, of course. As soon as Doctor Banner has finished his work, he and Agent Romanov will be moved to a secure location higher in the tower. It's too late to get them out of here but they'll be safe if we can fight off Blonksy's pack and stop the bombs. You and I will be in the thick of things."

"That's a big if. Guess we should suit up, then." There was a long pause and then Clint said, "Sir...Phil. This is a total cliche and I don't want you to hold that against me later if we survive this, but..."

Phil was already moving forward when Clint grabbed the front of his jacket and pulled him into a kiss. It was messy and a bit desperate and exactly right. He needed this, the heat of Clint's mouth and solidity of his body. There was a dull thunk as Clint's shoulders slammed against the door and the rush of want Phil felt at that sound was incredible.

Clint groaned softly and pulled Phil closer, so close that Phil could barely breathe. He had one hand buried in Clint's hair and his other arm was braced against the door. There wasn't enough time for this, not enough time for everything he wanted, and he suspected there might never be enough of anything with Clint. Thoughts of vampires and battles were pushed to the back of Phil's mind by the feel of Clint rocking his hips against him. Phil pushed back, groaning quietly at the feel of all that heat and hardness. The temptation just to forget the consequences and their duties and let things happen was overwhelming. It was the need for oxygen that finally forced Phil to break the kiss.

"When we get back to our world," Clint said, his breath whispering across Phil's jaw, "you are going to take me home where I will do all sorts of immoral things to you. Then we'll have dinner and talk about all that relationship stuff that we should probably talk about."

Phil felt as though he had run a marathon and he panted against Clint's neck for a moment, trying to regain his control. "Usually people do the dinner first and then the immoral things."

Clint grinned and Phil could feel it against his skin. "I'm not very good doing things in the right order."

"I've noticed."

"Complaining?"

Phil took a moment to look at Clint, his face flushed and his pupils dilated and marvelled a little that this could be his if they got out of here alive. "Not at all."

Their lips had barely grazed when klaxons started ringing, ear-splittingly loud in the confined space of the closet. Clint swore and clapped his hands over his ears.

"Guess our time is up!" he shouted.

Phil nodded his agreement and they wrenched the door open to stumble out into the corridor. The alarms were quieter there but no less urgent and the personnel who had been moving quickly before were running now.

"Armoury," Phil said, pointing and Clint nodded.

They ran for it, up two flights of stairs and towards the room that now only had a few stragglers picking up ammunition and kit. Clint suddenly slowed down and turned towards Phil, his expression horror-stricken.

"Fuck, I've just had a thought," Clint said. "Remember when Stark was giving us the grand tour of the tower, the one back in our world? After he finished the renovations and was trying to bully us into moving in?"

"I remember."

"Remember when I said that I could think of at least five ways to get around his security systems? Well, I just remembered one those ways and how much do you want to bet that the other me thought of it too?"

"That's not a bet that I'd take. What is it?"

Clint accepted a bundle of armour and began efficiently pulling it on as Phil did the same.

"Grappling arrow, zip line and one of the seventh floor windows," Clint quickly explained. "I could do it in under five minutes. The other me doesn't need to worry about injury so he could do it even faster."

"He could already be in here," Phil said.

From somewhere deep inside the building there came the muffled sound of an explosion.

"Pretty sure he already is," Clint said.

***

As soon as Clint put in his communication earpiece there was a burst of chatter. It took him a moment to sort through and pick out Coulson and Romanov's voices issuing orders, shouting for people to get off the comms and trying to direct groups to cover scenarios they had never planned for.

Apparently someone had given out special orders because his bow and quiver had been included in his kit. Clint suspected Romanov's influence and thanked her silently. The bow in Clint's hand was familiar and comforting. He slung the rifle that he had been given across his back, making sure it wouldn't interfere with his quiver, and gave the bow a quick check over before nodding to Phil.

"Ready?"

Phil's face was partially obscured by the faceplate of his helmet but Clint could still see the determined frown. "Ready. Do you have a plan?"

Clint shrugged. "Figured I'd head for the explosion."

"Good plan."

There was another explosion before they had gone more than a couple of floors up. The vibrations felt like they came from lower in the tower and Clint could almost guarantee that this meant Barton was in the air vents. It was what he would do, if he was attempting to storm the Stark Tower and open an access route to a platoon of ground troops.

"Barton, we need you on the fourth floor."

It was Romanov's voice in his ear and Clint immediately changed direction, running down the stairs towards four. He could hear Phil following and speaking into his comm, the familiar pattern of their partnership kicking in. Romanov met them at the fourth floor stairwell carrying a bundle of arrows.

"Barton's in the air ducts," she said bluntly.

"We guessed," Clint said.

"I thought you would." Her smile was nasty. "We've got a plan. We need him kept busy until Coulson gives the word."

"I can do that. What's the second part?"

It was a plan that might even work, Clint decided as Romanov outlined what they were doing. Timing would be important, as would keeping the other version of him busy so that he couldn't destroy the tower before phase two began.

"Think you can handle your part?" Romanov asked, holding out the arrows.

"Not a problem," Clint said. "How can I track him?"

Romanov held up a small tablet. "We've set this up to track any heat signatures in the air vents. At the moment there's only one and it's several degrees too low to be human."

A small yellow dot showed on a map of the tower, two floors up and half a floor over, moving rapidly.

"What can I do?" Phil asked.

"We need more bodies on three," Romanov said. "Try not to get bitten."

***

Five minutes after crawling into a vent, Clint swore and stopped moving.

"You OK in there?" Romanov asked.

She was somewhere in the corridor nearby pacing with him, back-up in case he needed it. He had a feeling that she was also there on Coulson's orders, but that wasn't something he planned to ask her about.

"Got too much gear on me," he said. "I'm going to have to lose some stuff."

"That's really not a good idea."

"Yeah? You try crawling through a space that's barely wider than your shoulders in full armour with this much useless ordnance on your back."

There was a moment's silence and then Romanov sighed. "There's an access grille ten feet in front of you."

"I know."

"Of course you do," Romanov muttered.

He dropped out of the vent in front of Romanov and pulled off his helmet, sighing with relief as a cool draught hit his sweaty hair.

"It's not going to matter much what I'm carrying if I'm making enough noise to wake the dead and getting stuck every twenty feet," Clint said as he stripped off body armour and let it fall to the floor. "He'll know exactly where I am. If I'm going to get near enough to do anything, I need to travel light."

He shrugged out of the heavy jacket and added it to the pile, dropping the rifle on top. The thick jumpsuit still felt like too much but at least he could move again.

"Better?" Romanov asked.

Clint settled the quiver on his back and threw his bow to Romanov. "Much better. Don't drop that, I might need it."

This time it was much easier to move through the vents. Tracking the yellow dot that he knew had to be Barton was a little trickier but it didn't take long for Clint to see the pattern and start anticipating. He could hear the way that the main battle was going, the gradual retreat farther into the tower as vampire numbers overwhelmed their forces. That didn't matter: his entire focus was now on Barton and finding a way to get ahead of him using every trick and shortcut that he knew.

Barton's relative lack of familiarity with the layout was becoming noticeable and Clint smiled to himself. All those hours that he had put in learning the sneakiest ways around the tower were paying off. The next time Phil tried to complain, Clint was definitely reminding him about this.

He hoped there would be a next time and this plan wasn't about to get all of them killed. His internal clock was ticking down and those bombs would be hitting soon if Fury hadn't talked the Council round. Clint pushed that thought out of his mind and concentrated on the part of the whole mess that he could actually do something about.

It seemed to take forever to finally close on Barton although in reality it was probably less than twenty minutes. Somewhere on the third floor, not far from the main fight now, Clint stopped to wait at a junction. Slowly, carefully, he extracted one of the arrows that Romanov had given him and settled to wait.

There was barely a sound as Barton approached and Clint caught himself approving of his technique, a thought that was definitely not appropriate under the circumstances. Barton crawled closer and Clint held his breath.

He waited until Barton was so close that Clint could have reached out to touch him and then he moved, thrusting with the arrow to push it hard into Barton's shoulder.

There was an angry snarl and Barton pushed and slid backwards, careless of noise now. Clint was moving to follow when there was another explosion, much louder this time, and the entire vent shook around him. He had no time to prepare or shout a warning. The vent collapsed and he fell into the middle of a knot of vampires and SHIELD soldiers.

Moments later another explosion rocked the tower sending plaster and debris into the air. There was confusion on the comms as conflicting blast points were identified and Coulson tried to impose some sense of order. Clint knew that it couldn't be the nuclear missiles, none of them would have survived that, but it was hard to shake the fear.

Someone grabbed his ankles and pulled. Clint tried to struggle for a moment before recognising Romanov and allowing her to pull him to the dubious shelter of the SHIELD soldiers. He rolled to his feet and she silently handed over his bow and a gas mask.

"How long?" he asked, shouting to be heard over the fighting and the alarms.

"Put the mask on," she answered. "Any minute."

There was an immense, feral roar from somewhere farther down the corridor and suddenly the vampires began falling back.

"He's mine," Romanov said as she pushed Clint behind her, fastening her mask on as she went.

It was Blonsky. The ridiculous cape was gone, his hair was a wild, tangled mess and he held a huge axe in his hands that chopped through two SHIELD soldiers with barely a pause.

All the Hammer horror-inspired theatrics were stripped away and Clint could easily see why Blonsky had remained such a threat in this world. Blonsky wasn't huge the way that Thor or Steve were, but he looked strong and waves of power and confidence rolled off him. Romanov looked tiny in front of him.

She caught Blonsky's first strike on her hastily drawn sword, the impact visibly jarring her. Twisting away, she managed somehow to slide the sword in and under and slash at his chest but Blonsky was too fast and he danced away.

There was a flurry of blows and parries that forced Romanov back a few steps. Clint nocked an arrow and drew, but they were moving too fast for him to take a shot. He managed to get a couple of other vampires with the special arrows instead. They were trying to sneak closer to the combatants and they collapsed immediately. Farther down the corridor Clint could see a crumpled figure in a leather coat with an arrow sticking out of his shoulder that had to be Barton.

The fight between Romanov and Blonsky continued, neither seeming to get the upper hand. Blonsky was now bleeding from a dozen cuts and Romanov had taken a fist to the ribs but they showed no signs of slowing.

"Masks on!"

The order came through the earpieces and over the building speakers in a strange stereo effect. Clint pulled his gas mask up and grimaced at the rubbery smell of the air feeding through the filters. A moment later there was a loud hiss and clouds of mist began flooding out of every vent and grate in the corridor. It poured out of the shattered air duct and the effect was almost immediate.

All around them, vampires began coughing and then collapsing. It worked faster than it had on Natasha and Clint assumed that whatever Banner had cooked up for this was much stronger.

Blonsky raised his axe one more time and Clint called Romanov's name, already knowing that she would never be able to avoid the strike.

Then Blonsky faltered, his axe wavered, and he crashed to the floor with a silent scream on his face as the antidote took hold.


	8. Chapter 8

The cafeteria had been given over entirely to the recovering vampires and there were sheet-covered beds and gurneys everywhere. Most of them held living humans but a few had black tags attached to mark the corpses. All the other beds around the building were filled with SHIELD personnel who had been injured during the attack. Phil had lost track of where his people were but they had all radioed in when the raid was over to assure him that they were alright. Nobody had said anything, but the fact that they were still here told Phil that the nuclear strike had been called off in time.

Doctor Banner had mixed his antidote with a good dose of sleeping gas before pushing it through the ventilation system so all the former-vampires were out cold along with several SHIELD personnel who hadn't been able to get their masks on fast enough.

The people that Clint had hit with his special arrows, including Barton, received an even larger dose of the antidote/sedative combination. They were going to be out for a long time. 

Phil was standing just inside the door to the mess hall with Romanov and he felt more tired than he could ever remember feeling in his life. Between the lack of sleep, the long fight and then worry about his people, the day seemed to have lasted for years. He could only imagine how Romanov and Coulson felt right now. There hadn't been a specific moment when he started to think of her as Romanov, so different from Agent Romanov and yet very similar, but it suited her better than he thought 'Natasha' would.

"Director Fury is sending us an extra medical team," Romanov said. "They're already working on replicating Doctor Banner's cure to use on the other infected cities. As soon as our back-up arrives, I'm sending out teams to track down the rest of the infected in the city."

"That's good," Phil said. "Very good."

"We've put Blonsky in custody," Romanov said.

"What are you doing about the rest of them?" Phil asked. "They all did some terrible things while they were infected."

Romanov shrugged. "That's something that I'll leave up to Director Fury. But Blonsky did some terrible things before he got infected. He forcibly infected a couple of scientists before injecting himself with the virus. Everyone else was under the influence of the virus when they committed their crimes."

Phil sighed. "By all accounts, he wasn't much better in my world."

"Sometimes people can't change, no matter what their story is."

"Sometimes people can, though." Phil nodded towards the far corner where Barton was lying still in a bed with Coulson in a chair beside him. "It's not always a good thing."

Romanov's eyes betrayed her worry. "Do you know what your Barton would do after something like this?"

"I can make a good guess," Phil said, remembering the weeks after Loki's attacks when he had been too ill to help him and Clint had pushed all his guilt and anger into work. "Keep an eye on him. If he looks like he's coping then he probably isn't."

"We'll look after him," Romanov promised.

Phil contemplated the room filled with sleeping people. They were all going to be deeply traumatised. Over the next few months there would be thousands, potentially tens of thousands, of men and women across the world facing the same thing.

"It's going to take a long time," Romanov said. "I don't think this is something that our society will ever just 'get over', or whatever the popular phrase is this week."

"They'll get over it," Phil said. "It will take a long time but they'll get over it until the next terrible thing happens. Then everyone will say that they'll never get over it and they'll never forget, but they will and things will go on until another terrible thing happens. It will happen over and over and life will always, eventually go on."

There was a long pause and then Romanov said, "I can't decide whether that's a hopeful thought or just fucking depressing."

Phil shrugged. "I'm a glass half-full man, myself."

***

Coulson and Romanov were there with Stark to see them off, back to their own world. Phil felt relieved to be back in his familiar suit and tie even though they were crumpled from several days of storage. Clint and Agent Romanov were also back in their own clothes and all their weapons had been returned. She still looked pale and there were shadows under her eyes but she was clearly recovering.

Phil smiled at the way they both seemed to be stroking and murmuring to their assortment of guns and knives. Clint hadn't let his bow and quiver leave his side since they were returned to him during the fight.

"So, are we all ready to go home?" Stark said cheerfully.

Phil had seen the scratches and dents on the Iron Man suit so he was unsurprised by the scrapes, cuts and bruises on Stark's face. From the grease marks and the way that his hair was standing on end, Phil guessed that Stark had spent most of the hours since the battle in his workshop and then supervising the team that moved the device. Throwing himself into work seemed to be Stark's coping mechanism on every world.

"I'm ready," Clint said. "Very ready."

Natasha smiled tiredly. "Going home sounds great right now."

Doctor Banner looked worried. "I'm still not sure that-"

"We've got the formula," Romanov said firmly. "Our scientists have been able to replicate it."

"Director Fury just told me that they're sending teams into Seattle tomorrow to start clearing the nests there," Coulson added. "We've got this."

"I guess that I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop," Doctor Banner said with a rueful look. "Nothing about gamma radiation and biology ever seems to go to plan."

"Bruce," Agent Romanov said gently, "your cure worked. I'm fine."

Doctor Banner smiled hesitantly.

"If it makes you happier, you can keep an eye on me when we get back." Agent Romanov rolled her eyes. "You and most of SHIELD medical, if I'm predicting things right."

"The patients woke up a few minutes ago," Coulson said. "They're groggy and disoriented, but they seem to be fine."

For a moment Phil's eyes met Coulson's. The other man shook his head slightly and Phil nodded. Barton wasn't awake yet.

"Fine, my cure seems to have worked," Doctor Banner said with a sigh. "I'm ready, then."

"Stark, how do we do this?" Phil asked.

Doctor Doom's machine sat in the middle of the room that Clint had confirmed mapped to his range in their world. Hopefully he was also right about the placement of his targets and other equipment, although Phil trusted the archer's spatial awareness more than anyone else's.

"From what you reported, you'll need to be within a couple of feet of the machine." Stark petted it fondly. "It might be a good idea to be touching it, as none of you could be certain that you weren't touching it when the transport happened. Next time, try for a more accurate recall. It's much easier for me."

"I promise, I'll take GPS co-ordinates and candid photos the next time I'm transported to an alternate universe," Clint said.

"Nobody likes a smartass," Stark said.

"So why do people like you?"

"I'm wounded." Stark smirked. "It's the fiendish good looks, of course."

Before it could devolve into one of their usual pun-laden, bizarrely insulting arguments, Phil cleared his throat. Both of them looked at him guiltily and it was such a familiar, normal moment that Phil was surprised when Steve didn't add his usual disapproving remark on the inappropriateness of their comments at a time like this.

"Right, fine, it's time," Stark said. "Step up, ladies, gentlemen and Barton. Time for you all to go home."

They all stepped closer to the machine and cautiously placed their hands on it.

"Now, whoever is near the green button with the big 'H' on it, press that," Stark said. "I'll be over here, in the corner, not getting transported to your world. Fewer vampires, that sounds nice, but the big metal whales from space? Not something I need to see either."

"I've got it," Agent Romanov said.

The sensation of power building in the air made Phil want to twitch and scrub at his face. It was uncomfortable, verging on painful.

Just as the green light flashed around them, he heard Clint say, "There's no place like home."

Then there was a stomach-churning sensation of falling, pain shot through his head and Phil's awareness faded into darkness.

***

Clint squinted as he opened his eyes. The bright lights overhead were definitely not helping his headache at all.

The loud alarms sounding around him were also unhelpful and for a moment he felt a surge of adrenaline because those were the alarms that signalled a vampire attack.

"Tony, they're waking up."

It was Steve's voice and Clint felt a flood of relief because this meant that wherever they were, it wasn't back on the vampire world. He really hoped that this was the right one.

"Who do we call?" Steve asked.

"Normally, we'd call Coulson," Stark said. "But as he's one of the sleeping beauties over there, that's going to be difficult."

"We should probably call Director Fury, let him know that we've found them."

"There was less finding and more suddenly appearing and setting off alarms."

Clint carefully sat up and winced as the pain in his head spiked. "Yeah, about those alarms. Could you maybe make them a bit quieter?"

"Jarvis, can you turn the alarms off now? We know they're here."

The alarms abruptly turned off and Clint sighed his relief at the silence.

Steve, Stark and Thor were clustered around the door to the range. Stark had that three days in a workshop look, but Steve and Thor were both suited up and ready for battle. The all looked tired.

Clint waved his thanks and slowly looked around. Phil was lying nearby, completely still. Natasha and Banner were probably on the other side of the machine. He thought that he heard Banner groan quietly and then Natasha's voice started softly swearing in Russian. They were fine so he scooted across the floor to Phil's side and touched his shoulder lightly.

"You should probably wake up now," he said. "Looks like we're back."

He waited for a long moment and then Coulson blinked, opened his eyes and smiled, and Clint's world started to make sense again.

"There's no place like home?" Phil said hoarsely. "Really?"

"Like I could turn down the chance to say that." Clint grinned. "You know you wanted to say it, admit it."

"Never."

"OK, I'm going to ask what I'm sure my buddies are thinking so...what the ever-loving fuck is going on?" Stark's flailing gesture took in the device, the groggy bodies and Steve's confused expression. "Explanation please?"

"It's a long story," Clint said. "You should probably call Director Fury now, I'm not telling it twice."

***

They ended up telling their story more than twice. In fact, Clint entirely lost track of how many times he had to explain what happened and when he had finished reciting it all again he got to spend hours in medical waiting for tests and writing up reports on what had happened.

By the time everything was finally sorted out, he was exhausted and the words 'vampire' and 'serum' had begun to look like something out of a strange language.

The medics immediately confined Natasha to SHIELD medical for at least a week so that they could keep an eye on her. Banner volunteered to stay with her and Clint wondered for a moment at the small, pleased smile on her face. He was too tired to give it any thought, though, beyond a vague mental note to talk to Natasha when everything settled down.

Between the reports and the medical examinations and tests, it was well over a day before he and Phil were released and allowed to go home. Clint dozed off during the trip back to Stark Tower and he was even too drained to be amused when he woke up with Phil slumped against him, snoring softly.

Clint felt a small pang of disappointment when they separated at the elevators, but then he walked into his bedroom and saw his bed and he realised that all he wanted right now was to sleep for a year.

***

It was mid-afternoon when Clint woke up. It had been dark when they got back to the tower and his muscles were stiff from lying in one position for too long. His stomach rumbled painfully and he realised that it had been hours - maybe even a day or two - since he last ate. Food would mean leaving his quarters, though, and Clint felt as though there was at least an inch of grime and muck on his skin.

Showers had been in short supply on the other world.

Stepping into the hot water was bliss and he spent a while just standing, allowing the heat to sluice away the dirt and unknot his muscles. The wonderful thing about life in the Stark Tower in this world was that hot water never seemed to run out.

Clint was towelling the water out of his hair when there was a knock at his door. He wrapped the towel around his waist as he walked across the room, already half-certain about who would be there.

Phil was carrying a large pizza box and Clint had never seen him dressed so casually. The sweatpants, t-shirt and bare feet suited him far better than Clint had imagined.

The look that Phil gave him, an odd mixture of hunger and bemusement, made Clint smirk cheerfully.

"I planned to feed you before asking whether you wanted to continue that discussion about all the immoral things we could do together," Phil said dryly, "but now I'm not so sure."

The scent of pizza sauce and melted cheese drifted up from the box and Clint snatched it out of Phil's hands.

"Sorry, but right now I'd sell my soul and a lifetime of sex for some food," he said, standing back from the door.

"It's a deal."

Clint had dropped the pizza box on his bed and was digging through a drawer for a pair of sweatpants when his brain processed the words and Phil's tone. He slowly turned around, still holding a handful of socks.

Phil smiled uncertainly. "If you want it, that is."

"If I want it," Clint repeated slowly. "Jesus, Phil, that's the big relationship shit right there and I haven't even eaten yet."

"Sorry?"

The sight of Phil Coulson, the man who epitomised competence and calm, looking so completely uncertain was too much. Clint threw the socks into the drawer and walked over to him. He framed Phil's face between his hands and kissed him, trying to express everything he was feeling through the touch of lips and tongues and shared breath.

"I want that," Clint said when he pulled back slightly. "I'm bad at this stuff, really bad, but I know that I want that."

Phil brushed a hand lightly down his back and Clint shivered, remembering suddenly that he was only wearing a towel.

"I should put some clothes on," he said, not moving.

"If you want pizza more than sex then that would be a good idea," Phil said with a soft smile.

There was a loud gurgle from Clint's stomach and he laughed. "Back in a minute."

He grabbed a pair of ancient pyjama pants and a ratty t-shirt, which weren't exactly a getting laid outfit but were at least at the top of a pile of clean clothes, and ducked into the bathroom for a minute. When he emerged Phil was sitting on the bed cross-legged with the pizza box open and a large stack of paper napkins beside him.

"You know, I have a desk and some chairs in the corner," Clint said as he joined him. "If you get pizza sauce on the sheets..."

Phil took a slice of pizza, somehow managing to get the stringy cheese to separate perfectly so that none of it ended up on his fingers or draped over the edge of the box. He was the only man Clint had ever met who could eat pizza that neatly without looking weirdly careful.

They ate in companionable silence for a while. Clint inhaled his first slice of pizza, barely pausing to chew, and his second slice disappeared only marginally more slowly. He picked up a third slice and paused.

"You know, I never pictured you for the eating pizza in bed type."

"I save it for special occasions," Phil said.

"Like?"

"The aftermath of transportation to alternate dimensions, recovery from saving the planet, the Superbowl."

Clint choked on an olive. "You watch the Superbowl?"

"When I can." Phil shrugged. "I like the half-time show."

"I'm starting to get a picture of what life with you is like."

"Oh?"

"Yeah. We'll eat junk food in bed, you'll make me watch crappy television and I'm never going to be allowed to be late with my paperwork again." A balled up napkin hit Clint on the side of his head and he grinned unrepentantly. "It sounds pretty good to me, you know. I particularly like the bit where I get to kiss you and maybe have sex with you whenever we want."

Phil leaned over to kiss him and Clint wanted to protest that they would definitely get pizza sauce on the bed if they did that but it was a pretty great kiss so he didn't.

"I promise," Phil said, releasing him to return to the pizza eating, "you can have the remote every other Tuesday."

Clint took a huge bite of pizza and flipped him off. He chewed slowly, thinking.

"Should we have stayed?" he asked eventually. "Not forever, I mean, but maybe for a few days. They needed help."

As always, Phil seemed to know what he was thinking. "The other you, Barton, will be fine eventually. There's nothing more we could have done."

"Yeah, but...I kind of know what he's going through," Clint said. "I've been there, in a way. If it hadn't been for you and Nat..."

"He's got Romanov and I," Phil said. "His version of us. They'll know what to do."

"But-"

"They'll work it all out."

"Is the other you in love with him?" Clint asked.

He wasn't certain why it mattered, it wasn't as though what happened there could determine what would happen here, but for some reason felt important.

Phil's soft smile gave him the answer. "Hopelessly. As I said, they'll work it all out. At least they'd already worked out their feelings before everything went wrong. They just hadn't had time to do much about it."

"Why do you think the other me tried to do that deal?"

"For the other me and the other Agent Romanov?" Phil shook his head. "I honestly don't know. I doubt that he did either. He didn't seem to know whether he was saving them for himself or from himself."

"I don't know which was more terrifying: the other Natasha or our Nat when she vamped out."

It was a blatant attempt to lighten the mood and Clint grinned as Phil went with it anyway. Maybe this was one of the reasons that he loved the man. He tested out the idea in his mind and it didn't feel too weird. It felt kind of right, actually. Like it was something he'd been feeling for a long time without daring to put a word to it.

"Definitely the other Romanov," Phil said solemnly. "Our one knows how to smile."

Clint hesitated, not sure that this was his best idea ever, and then said, "So the other you was hopelessly in love."

"He was."

"And you?"

Staring intently at the pizza box suddenly seemed like a very good idea to Clint while he waited for an answer. It was the thing they hadn't really said - not putting it into actual words - and he thought he knew the answer, but sometimes the answers he wanted weren't the answers he got. He wasn't even aware that he was holding his breath until he felt Phil's fingers on his jaw, insistently turning his head and titling his face up so that he could see Phil's eyes.

"What do you think?"

There was something in Phil's eyes, something huge and terrifying and so amazing that Clint didn't know how he hadn't seen it before. Phil just smiled and when he leaned over to kiss him, Clint sighed against his lips.

Phil pulled back with a small frown. "What?"

"I was just thinking," Clint said slowly.

"About?"

A dozen different replies were fighting to escape, all of them stupidly sappy and Clint was embarrassed for himself at how terrible they sounded, so he swallowed them down and grinned.

"About the fact that this pizza box is in the way if you want me to do anything immoral to you today," he said closing the lid and sending it spinning away to land on his desk.

"So you're done talking about this, I guess," Phil said with a nod towards the pizza box.

"I'm done talking about this," Clint agreed. "For today, anyway."

"Good."

Phil's lips were warm on his and this thing, kissing Phil, was becoming easier with every touch. Not familiar, Clint hoped it would never become something he could take for granted, but knowing how and where to touch and taste was becoming something that he knew deep inside.

They broke apart for long enough to strip t-shirts off each other and then Phil was bearing him down to sprawl on the bed and Clint arched his neck so that Phil could kiss the spot on his throat that always felt so fucking amazing. Phil's hands were everywhere, touching and learning, and Clint groaned as the touches became firmer, more intimate.

Staying passive was impossible. Clint flipped them over and grinned at the flush on Phil's face and the wide, pleasure drunk eyes.

"Yeah, this is going to be fun," he whispered.

Phil's eyes narrowed and he looked like he was going to protest so Clint kissed him and almost laughed out loud when Phil rolled them over a moment later while he was distracted.

There were touches and moans and eventually skin against skin and rumpled sheets and then just lying together in a sweaty, wonderful tangle of legs and arms. Clint retrieved a blanket from the floor to cover them as the heat slowly left their bodies and he was oddly pleased when Phil didn't protest at staying wrapped around each other.

"Hopelessly?" Clint asked sleepily.

"Go to sleep," Phil said fondly and Clint grinned against the skin on the back of his neck as he drifted away.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Art: Vampires In Manhattan](https://archiveofourown.org/works/557569) by [sian1359](https://archiveofourown.org/users/sian1359/pseuds/sian1359)




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